Book Log Extra: New York Times 100 Best Books of the 21st Century

The New York Times took a break from trying to get Joe Biden to drop out of the Presidential race to slow-release its list of the 100 best books of the current century (it did it in groups of 20 over the course of the week). I was going to say that this seemed a little presumptuous, except that The Guardian did the same thing... in 2019 (their top pick was Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, which in true American fashion I've not read but have seen the TV adaptation). 

The NYT's list is paywalled, so no link for you. But here's the list, with the ones I've read in bold (17 as opposed to 22 on the Guardian's list, though I did start The Last Samurai and bailed on it).

100. Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson

99. How to Be Both by Ali Smith

98. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

97. Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward

96. Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments by Saidiya Hartman

95. Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

94. On Beauty by Zadie Smith

93. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

92. The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante

91. The Human Stain by Philip Roth

90. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

89. The Return by Hisham Matar

88. The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis by Lydia Davis

87. Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters

86. Frederick Douglass by David W. Blight

85. Pastoralia by George Saunders

84. The Emperor of All Maladies by Siddhartha Mukherjee

83. When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut

82. Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor

81. Pulphead by John Jeremiah Sullivan

80. The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante

79. A Manual for Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin

78. Septology by Jon Fosse

77. An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

76. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

75. Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

74. Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

73. The Passage of Power by Robert Caro

72. Secondhand Time by Svetlana Alexievich

71. The Copenhagen Trilogy by Tove Ditlevsen

70. All Aunt Hagar's Children by Edward P. Jones

69. The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander

68. The Friend by Sigrid Nunez

67. Far From the Tree by Andrew Solomon

66. We the Animals by Justin Torres

65. The Plot Against America by Philip Roth

64. The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai

63. Veronica by Mary Gaitskill

62. 10:04 by Ben Lerner

61. Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

60. Heavy by Kiese Laymon

59. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides

58. Stay True by Hua Hsu

57. Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich

56. The Flamethrowers by Rachel Kushner

55. The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright

54. Tenth of December by George Saunders

53. Runaway by Alice Munro

52. Train Dreams by Denis Johnson

51. Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

50. Trust by Hernan Diaz

49. The Vegetarian by Han Kang

48. Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

47. A Mercy by Toni Morrison

46. The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

45. The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson

44. The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin

43. Postwar by Tony Judt

42. A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James

41. Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

40. H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

39. A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

38. The Savage Detectives by Robert Bolano

37. The Years by Annie Ernaux

36. Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

35. Fun Home by Alison Bechdel

34. Citizen by Claudia Rankine

33. Savage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

32. The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst

31. White Teeth by Zadie Smith

30. Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward

29. The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt

28. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

27. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

26. Atonement by Ian McEwan

25. Random Family by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc

24. The Overstory by Richard Powers

23. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage by Alice Munro

22. Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo

21. Evicted by Matthew Desmond

20. Erasure, Percival Everett

19. Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe

18. Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

17. The Sellout by Paul Beatty

16. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

15. Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

14. Outline by Rachel Cusk

13. The Road by Cormac McCarthy

12. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

11. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

10. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

9. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

8. Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald

7. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

6. 2666 by Roberto Bolano

5. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

4. The Known World by Edward P. Jones

3. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

2. The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson

1. My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

 Lentorama 2024: Clerical Crime Solvers

Day 8: Rabbi David Small

David Small is the new, bookish rabbi at a temple in suburban Boston. It's not clear that he's fitting in, and a murder on temple grounds - in which Small is a leading suspect - doesn't help his popularity. But he's able to help crack the case by applying his highly trained and logical mind to the facts at hand, starting a series that spanned several books and a TV adaptation.

I read the first book in the series a few years ago, had mixed feelings about it, and haven't gone back to the series since. Part of the problem was that the reading experience wasn't great, as I read the book using Hoopla and it didn't format that well on my phone. So if I can find physical copies of the books I may be more inclined to get back into them.

 Lentorama 2024: Clerical Crime Solvers

Day 7: Callie Anson

After the tumultuous end of her engagement, Callie Anson is looking forward to what she thinks will be the quieter life as the curate of a London church (which makes her more or less assistant clergy to the person already assigned). It turns out that the religious life isn't that much more peaceful, notably when she interacts with other male clergy who don't think women should be ordained.

When one of those dissenting vicars turns up dead, Callie's friend and mentor (who defended her choice of vocation to the dead man) is a prime suspect. Callie turns to her faith - and some innate sleuthing abilities - in order to prove her friend's innocence.

It looks like as the series goes on Callie is less involved with sleuthing and more with bringing her unique perspective to what's going on in the parish. There are still deaths, but it's not clear from the synopses I've read if she's materially involved with the investigations. 

I found it interesting that the author of the series, Kate Charles, isn't English at all, but from the American midwest. Maybe Anglican parishes here aren't conducive to crime solving prelates.

 Book Log 2023 #24: The Man from Berlin by Luke McCallin

In the midst of World War II, military intelligence officer Gregor Reinhardt is sent to Yugoslavia to investigate the murder of a German officer. Also killed was a young female filmmaker, loved by the locals and apparently involved with the dead officer. 

Reinhardt's investigation is hampered by the involvement of other agencies, including local German military intelligence, the Sarajevo police, the fascist ruling party of Yugoslavia, and German secret police. On top of navigating the competing investigations, he also has to battle personal demons with roots in his service during World War I.

That's a lot going on for one book, but the complexities are handled well, and the novel picks up steam as Reinhardt begins to assert himself in the investigation.  The novel location and local conditions also help the book stand out.

I found this an engaging wartime mystery, and look forward to future books. 

 Book Log 2023 #23: The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Life is unusually good for Daniel Sempere, as he and his wife Bea have a new baby boy and his old friend Fermin is about to be married. That peace is shattered when a stranger with a porcelain hand visits the bookstore and purchases a rare copy of The Count of Monte Christo, and after penning an inscription leaves it as a wedding present for Fermin.  That inscription leads Fermin to reveal a 20 year old secret, and he enlists Daniel to help track down the man with the porcelain hand before things take a serious - and deadly - turn.

The book pulls together characters and plot points from the first two novels in the series, but felt less Gothic/supernatural than those books. It's also much shorter, which may come as a relief to those who've worked through the 500-plus pages of the first two books. I liked it, but am curious if this marks a shift towards less fantastical storytelling.

 Book Log 2023 #22: The Messenger by Daniel Silva

After having his cover blown in the previous book, Gabriel Allon's career as a spy for Israel looks to be over, with the future promising a desk job that is often suggested by never wanted. An unexpected escape back into the field comes in the form of old friend and papal secretary Luigi Donati, who asks Allon to help uncover a terror plot against the Vatican. This leads Allon to undertake a related mission for the US against targets who, for political reasons, the US can't take care of on their own. 

This is very much in line with previous books in the series, with one notable exception. The bad guys this time are not Palestinian, but Saudi. As this interview makes clear, Silva used this book to explore how Saudi Arabia has a foot in both terrorist and anti-terrorist camps. I'll be interested to see if the focus remains on them in future books.

 Book Log 2023 #21: The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi

Jamie is working as a food delivery driver in New York during the Covid-19 pandemic, hating the job but making ends meet (barely).  An opportunity arises when a customer (and acquaintance) tells Jamie that the "animal rights organization" that he works for needs someone last minute for field visit. Jamie jumps at the offer.

What Jamie doesn't know is that the "animal rights organization" isn't exactly the ASPCA. It's more like Jurassic Park meets Godzilla on an Earth in an alternate dimension.

As is often the case, Scalzi writes a book that is fast paced, highly entertaining, and likely to irritate hard core sci-fi/monster movie types. I liked it quite a bit, as did my oldest son, who is into Godzilla and read this for a high school summer reading project.

 Book Log 2023 #20: Summer of the Danes by Ellis Peters

Brother Cadfael gets an opportunity to return to his home country, traveling with his former apprentice Mark (now a deacon) to visit two Welsh bishops to offer a message of good will from Mark's bishop and a reminder of the imposition of the Roman rite. Things go well with the first bishop, but then go awry when they get mixed up in a murder, the disappearance of a young woman, and a plot to overthrow a Welsh lord by his brother, who has allied with the Danes of the title.

As with many of the previous books, Cadfael does his best to correct love gone wrong and find justice - unofficial as it may be - for the murder he's investigating. We are getting close to the end of the series (only two books left), I'll be interested to see how (or if) the series gets wrapped up.

Book Log 2023 #19: Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch

London cop Peter Grant gets pulled into another magic-related homicide when an American student is killed in an Underground station with a pot shard.  The murder weapon and location are no coincidence, and the investigation goes back into the history of both local pottery and the subway. All this takes place while Grant's mentor, Inspector Nightingale, remains on the hunt for the Faceless Man.

Another highly entertaining entry in the series, which is quickly becoming one of my favorites.

 Book Log 2023 #18: Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Neruda

Unlike Bart Simpson, I would not have said I was familiar with the works of Pablo Neruda before reading this volume. I'm not sure I'd say I'm familiar with his works now. But I will say that, as someone who does not often read poetry, I liked these as much as any poems I've read. It's also astonishing that he wrote these while still a teen.

Neruda's life is also fascinating (he was also a politician and diplomat, often at odds with the Pinochet regime, and may have been assassinated). At some point I need to find a good biography.

 Book Log 2023 #17: The Premonition by Michael Lewis

Continuing the series of books about how things went wrong (The Big Short and to some extent The Fifth Risk), Lewis turns his eyes towards the Covid-19 pandemic. In this case, he profiles a group of US public health officials who could see what was coming and tried to get the word out, but was stymied by political forces in Washington. Not surprisingly the CDC comes in for a lot of criticism, which is wholly justified. 

The book doesn't really get into the ways the White House monkeyed with things, which kind of makes sense given the thesis of the book. Rather than be the umpteenth work to lament suggestions to drink bleach, the idea at play here is that the growing politicization of previously non-partisan agencies is a problem, and will create greater problems if it continues. The US government response to the pandemic certainly argues in favor of that idea.

The book is as readable as anything Lewis has written, and his focus on a few key players helps to keep the narrative manageable. 

 Book Log 2023 #16: Prince of Fire by Daniel Silva

Art restorer/intelligence officer Gabriel Allon is brought back into the fold when the bombing of Israel's embassy in Rome is connected to some highly classified files that would blow Allon's cover. He returns to Israel and officially rejoins the agency known as The Office, where he's put in charge of investigating the attack on the embassy. 

Allon assembles a team of agents, who eventually uncover the connection between a series of attacks, and the likely date of the next one. Allon goes back on the street to find the mastermind of the attacks, at one point meeting with Yassir Arafat for information (Allon apparently saved Arafat's life at some point, so is owed a favor).  But the mastermind of the attacks is one step ahead of Allon, forcing him to make a potentially painful choice if he wants to prevent the next attack.

This is the first book in the series to really focus on terrorism. The previous books were more focused on the lingering aftermath of the Holocaust, and in an interview Silva said he saw this book as the end of the series rather than the beginning of a new one. Given how many books there are in this series overall, I'll be interested to see if that's actually true.

 Book Log 2023 #15: The Shape of Water by Andrea Camilleri

This is not the novelization of the Oscar-winning movie about cross-species romance but rather the first in a series following Sicilian police inspector Salvo Montalbano. In this case, Montalbano refuses to close the case of a local grandee whose body is found by a couple of garbagemen in an area known for prostitution. The case has personal and political dimensions that implicate powerful local families, which puts Montalbano's life at risk as he tries to figure out what really happened.

The book was fine, but ultimately I wasn't particularly taken with it. Hard to say why, though I may have been expecting it to be more like the Bruno, Chief of Police series, which is a bit lighter in tone. Don't know if I'll bother reading on in the series.

 Book Log 2023 #14: The Big U by Neal Stephenson

This is Stephenson's first novel, which for a long time was almost impossible to find. He let it go out of print, and was happy to leave it out of print until (according to Wikipedia) he saw how much used copies were going for on eBay, and decided that the only thing worse than people reading this book was how much people were paying to read this book.

And while it doesn't measure up to later works, it's not bad. It's not always good, mind you, but there are hallmarks of later books to be found here. It also helps if you can suspend disbelief enough in the ways the book's satire of college life go off the rails into farce.

The book has a special place in my heart as it was inspired by Stephenson's time at Boston University, which I started at not long after he left.  I don't know that you needed to go to BU in the 1980s to really enjoy this book, but it doesn't hurt. I think it would also help if you were in the sciences, as many of the characters are, and they tend to be drawn the most completely.

Certainly worth a read if you're a fan and haven't yet read it.

 Book Log 2023 #13: The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

Charlie is a high school freshman at a Pittsburgh-area high school, and as an observant and introverted kid is pretty isolated. The book is framed as a series of letters Charlie writes to an unnamed pen pal, to whom he details the ups and downs of the year, involving family and friends. He has specific difficulty coming to grips with the death of his best friend (by suicide) and a favorite aunt (traffic accident).

Much of the plot revolves around issues that are just under the surface - Charlie's crush on one of his senior friends, the other senior's secret relationship with a football player, and Charlie's sister being stuck in an abusive relationship. Things ramp up at the end of the school year, when many of these issues come to the surface, and in one case spark a startling revelation for Charlie.

I didn't quite connect to this book, which is something I run into quite a bit with YA books. I think I make comparisons to my own growing up, and am too quick to discount the book when it goes too far astray from my own experience. Which is a problem, as it's not like my childhood was some Platonic ideal. I also was unlikely to pick up this book, other than it fit a reading challenge, so my heart may not have been it it from the start.

 Book Log 2023 #12: Billy Bathgate by E. L. Doctorow

Doctorow said he was inspired to write this book by a picture he saw of two men in tuxedos standing on the deck of a tugboat. The image suggested what he called "the cult of gangsterism," and led to this book about a teenager who becomes part of Dutch Schultz's gang.  He becomes a kind of a gofer, doing low level work (casing apartment buildings, etc.), which eventually leads to him spending a lot of time with Schultz's latest moll, Drew Preston. Billy's interest in Drew grows as Schultz's interest in her wanes, leading Billy and Drew into an affair that adds an extra layer of danger to their day-to-day life in Schultz's orbit.

This book fits into the same mold as Ragtime and World's Fair, using historical New York as a backdrop for stories of race, class, and family. I liked it about as much as those other books, though I wasn't crazy about the ending (I've read a few thing saying it's too sentimental, which I think may be right). 

 Book Log 2023 #11: The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton

Mike (not his real name) is an 18 year old, who as an 8 year old experienced a trauma so profound that it has left him mute. As he grows up, Mike discovers that he has two significant talents - art and lock picking.  Art leads him to a kindred spirit, but the lock picking threatens to take him away from her, so he has to devise a plan that will both free him of the criminal gang making use of his lock picking and allow him to return to the one person he loves.

I liked the book well enough, but not as much as reviewers or award committees, as it did quite well with those groups. I do see why it would win an Alex Award, given to adult fiction that also has a "special interest" for YA readers (I picked this book to satisfy a reading challenge involving Alex Award winners). But I really don't see how it won an Edgar Award for best novel over Faithful Place, part of Tana French's Dublin Murder Squad series. 

 Book Log 2023 #10: If Then by Jill Lepore

As much as we are (rightly) concerned about the ways tech companies collect, use, and misuse our personal data, the concept of data mining, and using the results of mining to direct politics, business, and everything in between, is not new. The Simulatics Corporation was a pioneer in the field, and this book looks at how the company came about and the ways in which they influenced society in the 1960s.

There's much in common with how the company collected and used data to guide politicians and advertising, notably providing consulting services to the Kennedy campaign in 1960. Unlike today, the company always feels a little on the edge, possibly due to the limits of technology at the time, or perhaps due to the personalities of its founders (one a mid-level ad man, the other a bipolar mathematical genius). It's not all that surprising that the company shut down in 1970, as it never seemed to be that stable in terms of a business.

The book does provide plenty of opportunities to think about how Simulatics informs today's big data environment, while also demonstrating that many of the issues we're facing aren't exactly new, and that the past may have something to teach us about how to deal with the present.

 Book Log 2023 #9: The Odd Clauses by Jay Wexler

Some parts of the US Constitution are pretty well known (if occasionally misinterpreted), like the First Amendment's right to free speech. But then there are other parts that are less familiar, or seem less relevant in today's world. Why is there a whole amendment on not forcing people to put up soldiers in their homes? What exactly is a bill of attainder? And why does so lofty a document get into weights and measures? 

In this book, Wexler (who, full disclosure, I knew in high school and have occasional contact with over social media) examines these less familiar parts of the Constitution, and shows how they apply to the present day with regards to broader themes in the law (for example, the chapter on the Third Amendment gets related to privacy). 

The dense subject matter is leavened along the way with a fair amount of humor and personal observation. This isn't surprising given that Wexler once wrote a scholarly article about which justices generated the most laughter during argument (there's also a sequel).

If you're interested in the Constitution, or in the ways common law is able to connect the seemingly anachronistic to current day concerns, this is very much worth reading.

 Book Log 2023 #8: Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich by Norman Ohler

I'd heard from time to time over the years that Hitler was on drugs during World War II, but this was always somewhere between a rumor to an assertion, with no real corroboration. In this book, Ohler presents the results of his research, and details not only Hitler's drug use (generally under a doctor's supervision), but the widespread use of drugs by the military and the German people in general.

In one respect, this isn't that surprising, between the history of now-illegal drugs being widely available in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and the known use of drugs (usually stimulants) by troops in wartime to fend off fatigue. The scope of the drug use, as presented by Ohler, is what's surprising.

While several drugs are discussed, the main focus of the book is on a methamphetamine called Pervitin. The book paints a picture of a nation popping Pervitin regularly, from soldiers on the front lines to civilians back at home. Hitler's drug use saw him go from doctor-administered vitamin and hormone shots to a regimen that included Pervitin and Eukadol, which we would know better as oxycodone.

All of this drug use is seen as a key factor in Germany's early successes in the war, but also a significant factor in its eventual loss, as dependency led to mental and physical breakdown. 

The book is quite readable and eye-opening. Assuming you believe that Ohler is correct in his assumptions. Not everyone is convinced that his recounting is on the level, either based on contrary evidence or thoughts that Ohler, a novelist by trade, spiced things up a bit to improve the story (this review is particularly critical). The linked review also notes that the book serves as a bit of an apology for Nazi Germany and its atrocities, blaming it on the drugs.

As a book Blitzed is successful, as it's engaging and well-paced. Whether or not it's accurate...