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Top 5 of 2009
21st Jan 2010 in Writing
Okay, so I’m a bit late with this list, but it’s been a busy month.
First, books. I read 86 books last year (30 novels, 11 short story collections, 11 poetry collections, 14 non-fiction, 13 young adult novels, and 7 graphic novels). The following is a short list of my favourites, only a couple of which were actually published in 2009.
Books
- Rain – Kirsty Gunn (somewhere between poetry, short fiction, and a novel)
- The Blood of Strangers – Frank Huyler (this should be on everyone’s how-to-learn-to-write list)
- If On A Winter’s Night A Traveler – Italo Calvino (how is it possible for a book to be so complex yet so fun and easy to read?)
- Stripping and Other Stories – Pagan Kennedy
- The Terror – Dan Simmons (this took me seven months to read and is totally ridiculous, but I still can’t stop thinking about it)
Short Stories
- Mr Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore – Robin Sloan (on Escape Pod)
- The Lepidoctor – Mick Jackson (in Ten Sorry Tales)
- The Black Forest – Pagan Kennedy (in Stripping)
- Suck, Blow – Lauren Simpson (in Stolen Stories)
- I Dreamed I Fucked Stephen King While We Were Both on Vacation in the Cayman Islands With Our Spouses – xTx (on Oprah Read This)
Biggest Disappointments
- Electric Literature
- Anthem – Ayn Rand
- The Harrowing – Alexandra Sokoloff (my fault really; I thought this author was far more intelligent than she appears to actually be)
- The Wire in the Blood – Val McDermid (I tried to like Val because, you know, awesome prolific queer writer; but I just couldn’t handle 480 pages of boredom)
- The Birthing House – Christopher Ransom (people actually like this masturbatory shit?)
Right, that’s it. I’m ready for 2010.