Books from 2019

I kept reading books. Here are some from 2019 that stuck with me in a big way. Maybe you’ll enjoy some of them too? (I realized as I put together this list that there were a LOT of books I really liked this year. An embarrassment of riches, really. There were even some books I left off, not because I didn’t think they were worth mentioning, but because this list was getting foolishly long…)

The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu: There must have been dust or something in the air when I was reading the title story in this book because…. OK, there wasn’t any dust. I was full on crying. This guy can really write. (They’re mostly science fiction, fantasy, and such.)

The Feral Detective by Jonathan Lethem: Almost everything I love (and some of what I hate) about California is in this book. It’s a weird sort of noir mystery story.

Age of Anger: A History of the Present by Pankaj Mishra: A history of mostly forgotten thinkers from the early 20th century. A fascinating take on where our world is at today (and has been for a hundred years or so) and suggests an answer to why so many men are determined to find their answers in violence.

The Blue Hawk by Peter Dickinson: The type of story that isn’t much written anymore. All the action swirls around the progonist’s rejection of his social and cultural and religious role. Mystical and numinous and long out of print. (The library is your friend. My copy hadn’t been checked out in about 20 years.)

The Quatrian Folkways by Tim Boucher: http://www.timboucher.ca/quatria/ A friend of mine has been writing these alternate universe myths, history, what have you that remind me quite a bit of some of Tolkien’s more obscure writing. Worth checking out, for sure.

Confessions of an Imaginary Friend: A Memoir by Jacques Papier by Michelle Cuevas: Sometimes I read a writer and I’m jealous of how exceptional a writer they are. This one is for kids, but the writing is so good, I think anyone would get something out of it. After this one, I promptly read everything else she wrote.

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin: Read this for my book club. I’d been meaning to read it for years, but sometimes you need an extra little shove to read a 600+ book of history. An excellent work of history. A good reminder that there are no giants in history. Only people who choose to do the best they can and those who don’t. (A vast oversimplification, I realize.)

Riders in the Chariot by Patrick White: A few unlikely people bounce off each other in 1950s Australia. Fascinating and weird and deeply mystical and, I guess, totally my cup of tea. Also, this one had some beautiful sentences in it, if you’re into that kind of thing.

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante: Another book club book. The story of a friendship between two girls in 1950s Italy. Yeah, this one’s great.

There There by Tommy Orange: Many different characters converge on a Native American powwow in Oakland. Its multi-character viewpoints are used to excellent effect (sort of like GRR Martin’s Game of Thrones, but I’d say more effective and not needing several volumes to get there).

Famous Men Who Never Lived by K. Chess: What if you were a refugee from an alternate reality? I was beguiled by the title, but the rest of the book had me. There’s also a bit of a mystery here. The author’s first book, it’s got some first book-y problems, but impressive.

The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe: (Really four books.) I’d been hearing about this book for a long time, but a friend finally pressed it into my hands. Some of the strangest science fiction I’ve ever read. It never went where I was expecting and eventually I just gave up trying to predict and went along for the ride.

The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil: Sometimes a book has a kind of echo with the present as this one does from the 1930s. I only got through volume 1, because it’s quite long. Also, there were some sentences that made me laugh out loud, which is pretty great.

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton: Whodunnit as video game or Quantum Leap, basically. For how much I seem to love the whodunnit genre, I read precious little of it. This was a perfect airplane book. (Shoutout to Knives Out, another whodunnit, and maybe my favorite movie of 2019.)

Rejoice, a Knife to the Heart by Steven Erikson: Aliens (or their representative) show up, abduct a science fiction author, and technomagically prevent all violence on Earth.

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine: Another excellent airplane read. A SF novel about an ambassador making her way through an extremely alien culture. A bit of a mystery here, too.

H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald: A memoir of a woman training a hawk and wrestling with grief at her father’s death. Raw and deeply personal, but also extremely well-written. I don’t think I’ve ever read anything quite like it.

Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang: Stories by one of my favorite science fiction writers. Didn’t disappoint.

Lolly Willowes, or, the Loving Huntsman by Sylvia Townsend Warner: One of those old books that might’ve been written yesterday. Not much happens and everything happens, or, a woman finds her place in the world.

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover: Sometimes books deserve their popularity. This is one of those.

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire: (I’m definitely getting tired of writing this list, but I’m almost done…) If you like Tim Powers, you’ll like this one. Also, it’s got a kind of time travel thing to it, which I always love.

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone: A short book, I would’ve happily read several hundred more pages of it. Two secret agents fight each other through time and space, writing letters to each other, and eventually falling in love. Sounds cheesy, yeah, but the writing is so so good.

The Dragon Waiting: A Masque of History by John M. Ford: Another one that’s long out of print. (Interlibrary loan, y’all.) An alternate history 15th century Europe with a drop of magic in it. Many good things to say about this one.

Gideon the Ninth by Emily McGovern: The last book I read in 2019. Space necromancers + a whodunnit. What’s not to love? Also, some really top notch sword fights. Entertaining, just a lot of fun.

The Secret Santa Who Was Too Secret

Once there was a secret Santa* who was so secret no one knew about him or even if he was. This was a real bummer for that Santa because he really wanted to give out presents. They were really nice presents too. A box made of boxes. An extremely polite and tidy badger. A sword made of chocolate and almonds. A sword made of pickled beets. I could go on and on.

Moral: I could go on and on, but won’t.

* Santa Flues, natch.

A Snowglobe of Spiders

Once there was a witch. She made many terrifying crafty type objects. A blender made from a human skull. Dice–knucklebones, natch–that always come up snake eyes. A deck of ominous tarot cards. Some really unpleasant tea, otherwise harmless. But her most terrifying creation is a snowglobe full of spiders. When wound, it plays Little Drummer Boy.

Moral: Spiders, amirite.

A Murder of Crows

Once there was a murder of crows. They were pretty happy about that, in spite of the ominousness of their collective noun, or term of venery, if you will. People often wondered why they liked to hang out all together. I mean, think of all the poop! (You didn’t have to imagine it, because it was there all over the ground.) One time there was a murder, but the crows didn’t really mind.

Moral: Sometimes the world just keeps on rolling by.

Down and Out at the Certificate Shop

Floyd was pretty bummed. He wanted to read about painted gibbons, but before he could check out that particular volume of Spoonstrel’s Taxonomy of Apes and Suchlike, he had to get this certificate. First, he’d gone to this guy who’d given him this certificate (on vellum with gold filigree, natch). Sweet, I’m off to the races! Floyd had thought. That is, until he turned in his certificate to this other guy who was all, Hey now! This certificate is expired and then quickly wrote yesterday’s date on the certificate. Excuse me, but did you just write yesterday’s date on that certificate? Floyd said. No, the #2 certificate guy said, staring at Floyd, unblinking. So Floyd went back and got a different certificate. Every time he tried to use it, it didn’t work out. They were all invalid for different reasons: the filigree needed to be silver, not gold; one of the certificates was in Russian; someone had drawn a rocketman in crayon on the back; it just went on and on. After 6 hours and 23 minutes, the #2 certificate guy said, Actually, hey, you know? I just remembered: We don’t accept any certificates here. We only accept certificates in our southern office. It’s 800 miles away. Good day sir! Floyd said and forcefully wandered out.

Moral: Who understands certificates? I sure don’t!

Playing with Dynamite

Remember that forgetful Walrus? I didn’t think so. Anyway, he was friends with this Carpenter. Together they’d built this pretty sweet boat. Really, it was a bunch of boats all tied together, but it seemed to float better that way. There was another big mass of boats that had come along a while back. They were built by a Unicorn, a Lion, and some other animals, I guess. They were all, “Hey Walrus and Carpenter! Come join us! We’d float so much better if you tied up with us!” The Walrus and Carpenter were pretty ok with it for a while. But then all these freaking Unicorns and Lions kept hanging out on their boat. “We can’t have this!” the Carpenter said. The Walrus was like, “I’m ok with it. The Unicorns and Lions have some pretty cool gewgaws.” The Carpenter kept stewing and stewing, really just obsessing over how great things were when they were floating on their own. He was remembering all the good times they had before their boat shrank (mysteriously–they suspected wizards and black magic and stuff). Then, while the Walrus was sleeping, the Carpenter ransacked their boat looking for a knife or a saw or a laser or something to cut their boat loose. That Carpenter just tossed a bunch of cool stuff over the side, also he cut up his hands and feet (mysteriously–he suspected wizards and black magic and stuff). All the animals on the other boats were like, WTF, man!?!? The Carpenter said (and there was a fair amount of spittle involved), “Things were better before in the magical time I barely remember!!” and then, inexplicably, started cutting through the part of the boat that had the rope tying their boat to all the others (he ignored the rope completely, for some reason) and all this water started pouring in. The Walrus woke up and was all, WTF, man!? Why is all our shit floating in the water? Meanwhile, the Unicorn was like, “Hey, I’ll just cut this rope then, yeah? See ya!” The Walrus got ready to sail away in one of the other boats. Meanwhile, the Carpenter, who seemed to have forgotten what to do with the knife or laser in his hand, just watched his golden umbrella floating away.

Moral: When you start behaving badly, don’t overestimate how much people like or need you.

Rubbish or Not

Sonia Akakievich was inconsolable. Bjorn Bjornbjornssonsson had tossed her great-great-grandfather’s antique coat in the garbage, or so she thought. Turns out, he’d just set it down next to the garbage cans to air out. Really, there was no good reason for why he’d done so. Sonia waved around the portrait of her great-great-grandfather. “If you’d only made it clear to the garbage collectors that this was an important coat, they wouldn’t’ve assumed it’s rubbish and carted it away!” “I thought it was Thursday!” Bjorn Bjornbjornssonsson said.

Moral: The garbage gets picked up on Friday.

Blockbuster Training Modules

In an alternate dimension (Dimension X-423) where movies and television were never invented, the most popular form of entertainment comes in the form of training modules. This year, people are waiting with breathless anticipation for the fourth version of the training module, “Ethics Compliance, Fnord, and You.” But please don’t count out “Manufacturing Export Requirements (Interstellar),” what some consider the probable sleeper hit of the year. There are some who claim that the upcoming slate of training modules are simply derivative retreads of what’s come before. Not so, say others, implying that the naysayers are simply not discriminating enough to detect the wonderfully subtle variations in the eight training modules on HIPAA Compliance (Arcane). For the 18th year in the row, Playskool’s Multiple Choice Test toy outsells all the other toys on the market, beating out RadioButtons and Fill-in-the-Blanks.

Moral: Be glad you don’t live in an alternate dimension where the only form of popular entertainment is training modules.