tops of 2009

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I’ve never been big on predicting the Oscars, an exercise which seems more like political analysis than art criticism. And while I read lots of contemporary literature, I rarely read books in the year they’re published—that means paying for hardbacks, since the library queue for new books is always long. So my “best of” lists are the lists of a semi-hermit, culturally speaking. At least, they’re more a reflection of where I am (thinking about babies and circuses, loving realism despite my hunger for whimsical slippage) than where the culture is. But hey, whose aren’t? So without further ado, here’s where I was in 2009. Where were you?

My ten favorite books of 2009:
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates
The Last of Her Kind by Sigrid Nunez
A Million Nightingales by Susan Straight
Specimen Days by Michael Cunningham
The Final Confession of Mabel Stark by Robert Hough
Shoot an Iraqi: Art, Life and Resistance Under the Gun by Wafaa Bilal
The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World by Mike Davis
Normal People Don’t Live Like This by Dylan Landis

My five favorite movies of 2009:
The Hurt Locker
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Away We Go
Inglourious Basterds
Up

Comments

Claire said…
Hmm. I'm really enjoying You Better Not Cry: Christmas Stories by Augusten Burroughs right now. And it's a 2009 book!

Otherwise, mostly off-year like yourself. Not sure I even saw 5 movies in the theater this year. Would have been ludicrous to say several years ago. Ah well.
December 31, 2009 at 7:04 PM
Cheryl said…
There are a million reasons to wait for Netflix, but alas, I'm happily addicted to theater movies.
January 3, 2010 at 10:09 PM
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