Iván Thays
carátula inglesa de la novela
Y empezaron a salir las listas de Lo Mejor del Año. Esta es de The Guardian. La lista es de Justine Jordan y la encabeza Freedom de Jonathan Frazen y One day de David Nichols. ¿El único autor castellano mencionado? Santiago Roncagliolo y la traducción de Abril rojo.
Otros libros mencionados:
It was a great 12 months for the comic novel, with Howard Jacobson?s uproarious investigation of grief, friendship and British Jewishness, The Finkler Question(Bloomsbury, £18.99), a Man Booker winner that surprised and pleased in equal measure (?) Surely the year?s most pleasurable read and now a Costa contender, Skippy Dies by Paul Murray (Hamish Hamilton, £13.99), charted teenage highs and lows at an Irish boarding school: Patrick Ness called it ? a rare tragicomedy that?s both genuinely tragic and genuinely comedic?.
Christopher Tayler applauded Ian McEwan?s ?elegant and surprising? response to global warming in Solar (Jonathan Cape, £13.99): ?instead of applying doom and gloom, he reaches for a lighter, more comic mode than usual?. Meanwhile, Alfred Hickling fell in love with Tiffany Murray?s Diamond Star Halo (Portobello, £12.99), a ?glam-rock Dodie Smith? extravaganza about coming of age in a rural recording studio in the 70s. Moving from Wales to San Francisco, later in the year he found Armistead Maupin back to his ?rapturous best? with Mary Ann in Autumn (Doubleday, £17.99), revisiting the Tales of the City cast 20 years on.
Lloyd Jones followed his 2007 hit Mr Pip with a novel that Joanna Briscoe described as ?extraordinary?. Hand Me Down World (John Murray, £14.99), charting a woman?s quest for her child from Africa to Berlin and told through a series of unreliable testimonies, shows that ?Jones is becoming one of the most interesting, honest and thought-provoking novelists working today?. A mother?s journey also features in one of the most internationally acclaimed novels of the year, Israeli author David Grossman?s To the End of the Land (Jonathan Cape, £18.99).
For Michel Faber, it was a German novel that really stood out. Jenny Erpenbeck, he wrote, ?is one of the finest, most exciting authors alive?, and Visitation (Portobello, £10.99), the story of a grand house and its occupants in eastern Germany throughout the 20th century, ?allows us to feel we?ve known real individuals, experienced the slow unfolding of history, and bonded unconditionally with a place?. Blogger Sam Jordison, meanwhile, recommended Johanna Sinisalo?s Birdbrain (Peter Owen, £9.99), a Finnish wilderness thriller that takes its inspiration from Heart of Darkness: it promises ?a sense of lurking horror that will leave you troubled for weeks?.
There were compelling debuts on our First Book Award shortlist, including Maile Chapman?s wintry tale of a Finnish sanatorium, Your Presence Is Requested at Suvanto (Jonathan Cape, £12.99), and Ned Beauman?s riotous Boxer, Beetle (Sceptre, £12.99). For our first novels columnist, Catherine Taylor, shortlistee Nadifa Mohamed?s Black Mamba Boy (HarperCollins, £12.99) created ?a compelling account of the refugee experience? out of the raw material of her father?s epic, unlikely journey from Somalia to postwar Hull. She also acclaimed Amy Sackville?s The Still Point (Portobello, £12.99), recent winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys prize, which contrasts an early polar expedition with the present day. ?
Thriller columnist John O?Connell recommended Peter Temple?s Truth(Quercus, £7.99), a thwarted murder investigation set in Melbourne, as ?an unflinching examination of the way money buys power?, along with Stuart Neville?s Collusion (Harvill Secker, £12.99), a tale of dirty politics in post-ceasefire Belfast. For Steven Poole, Robert Littell?s The Stalin Epigram (Duckworth, £16.99), which follows turbulent poet Osip Mandelstam into the Lubyanka, was a ?masterclass? of paranoia. Maya Jaggi was impressed by Red April by Santiago Roncagliolo (Atlantic, £12.99), since named one of Granta?s Best Young Spanish-Language Novelists, which uses the serial-killer genre to lift the lid on Peru?s bloody recent history.
Crime columnist Laura Wilson was an early fan of Belinda Bauer?s debut Blacklands (Corgi, £7.99), told from a child?s point of view, which went on to win the Crime Writers? Association Gold Dagger; she also recommended Zoë Ferraris?s City of Veils (Little, Brown, £11.99), a murder mystery set in Jeddah. Well-written horror novels are a rare breed: Eric Brown applauded Joe Hill?s Horns (Gollancz, £9.99), in which supernatural devilry and all-too-human evil mingle in smalltown America. Meanwhile, blogger Damien G Walter enjoyed the literary fantasy of the year, finding in China Miéville?s Kraken (Pan, £7.99), a tale of cops and apocalypse in an alternative London, ?a prodigious imagination letting rip?.
Turning to short stories, Alex Clark called Yiyun Li?s second collection,Gold Boy, Emerald Girl (Fourth Estate, £16.99), which explores the changes in Chinese culture and society, ?hugely impressive?. Amy Bloom?s sharp eye was cast on American family life (Where the God of Love Hangs Out, Granta, £10.99), and Helen Simpson?s on the global betrayals of climate-change apathy and the personal privations of middle age (In-Flight Entertainment, Jonathan Cape, £14.99). Hermione Lee acclaimed Colm Tóibín?s collection The Empty Family (Viking, £17.99), stories of ?yearning, exile and regret? that range from 1970s Barcelona to troubled present-day Ireland.
Finally, Steven Poole was entranced by Padgett Powell?s The Interrogative Mood (Profile, £9.99), a novel composed entirely of questions, from ??Are your emotions pure?? to ?Do you have any friends?? to ?Are you for or against canals, in principle?? ?Is this the most bloody-mindedly brilliant new work of fiction I have read this year?? he wondered. If Freedom seems too predictable a literary gift, why not take a chance on this?
