The Best Books of 2010 (Part One)

I read a lot of books. A lot. Last year, I posted a "Best Books of 2009" in November. This year, because I have already read so many great books, I decided to do one post for the first half of the year and one for the second half. I'm sure my adoring public has been waiting with baited breath, and will appreciate the extra recommendations...

The Clive Cussler Award (Could not put this book down):

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson

Given that his previous book in the Millenium trilogy won this award last year, it is only fitting to hand it to Larsson again. Deservedly so, as his second book kept me turning the pages so quickly I got windburn. After page 200 I dare you to attempt to put this book aside...it will not be possible.

The David Simon Award (Smartest Book):

The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons

Hilarious, witty, insightful - all these labels and more could be applied to this book that also displayed an inhumanly encyclopedic knowledge of basketball and pop-culture. If you want to understand basketball or even more about sports in general, you have to read this book.

The James Patterson Award (Worst Book):

Omerta by Mario Puzo

I almost went with the new Dan Brown book (unread) and, truly, this one really pains me to write about. Sigh. The Godfather is rightfully a classic but this was a poor attempt on Puzo's part. Not quite as bad as The Godfather Returns / Revenge but it might as well not have been written by Puzo. All the things that made his other novel so great were shunned and replaced with a terrible and predictable story.

The Rick Reilly Award (Best Written Line):

If the Dead Rise Not by Philip Kerr

(p. 454) "And if the house wasn't haunted, I knew I was, and probably always would be. Some of us die in a day. For some, like me, it takes much longer than that. Years, perhaps. We all die, like Adam, it's true, only it's not every man that's made alive again, like Ernest Hemingway. If the dead rise not then what happens to a man's spirit? And if they do, with what body shall we live again? I didn't have the answers. Nobody did. Perhaps, if the dead could rise and be incorruptible and I could be changed for ever in the blinking of an eye, then dying might just be worth the trouble of getting killed, or killing myself."

Ellroy Award*(Most Information Packed into One Novel - New!):

Exodus by Leon Uris

He literally could not have packed more info into this book about the birth of Israel if he tried. Whether giving the history of the holocaust, the Jewish state or religious background there are more facts in here than an atlas.

Top 5 Books of the First Half of 2010

5. Wizard and Glass by Stephen King

I am a big Stephen King fan - as evidenced by The Stand hitting number 3 on my list in 2009. This book blew me away for a couple of reasons: a) it is unlike anything else he has written before or since ; b) it is possibly the best romance story I have read. Romance? you say, Stephen King? In short order: yes, and yes. This novel, part of his epic Dark Tower series contains some of his best writing of his career.

4. Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow

This is an older novel and is highly regarded as a classic of the crowded, courtroom - drama field so overpopulated by John Grisham. Turow, in my humble opinion, has written the book Grisham always wishes he could. The story is realistic, moving and often insightful. The final twist literally takes your breath away.

3. If the Dead Rise Not by Philip Kerr

Philip Kerr's Bernie Gunther novels continue to amaze with their consistency and fantastic writing. And...somehow Kerr always manages to pull the rug completely out from under his reader with one stunning twist after another. This novel helped to shade the entire series in a new light for me - Bernie Gunther is a survivor who has bitten and clawed his way through one of histories darkest periods. His existence is a brutal purgatory where redemption and judgement always seem just out of his grasp (rightfully so?). I am eagerly awaiting the seventh offering: Field Grey due out in the UK in October 2010.

2. Open by Andre Agassi

1. The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons

These two books were so close in the rankings that, in honor of Simmons, they demand a point-by-point breakdown.

Purpose of the book: Agassi sets out to hold a mirror to his entire life and truly reflect on his whole being. He comes to the conclusion that tennis, as much a part of his life as it was, is not the most important part. Simmons write the defining book on the NBA. Period. Edge - Agassi

Writing Style: Agassi is straightforward and his prose is incredibly open and shockingly not self-serving. Simmons breaks up his book with more statistical analysis than Wall Street. Add in Simmons hilarious footnotes and we have a winner. Edge - Simmons

Best Part of the Book: Agassi details his comeback that leads to him playing the best tennis of his life long after he has passed an age when people continue to play. It is thoroughly inspiring. Simmons puts up his Pyramid of the top 96 guys in the NBA and the reasons why. It is thoroughly hilarious. Edge - Even

Revelations: Agassi could not win a tournament once because his wig was falling off. He also used crystal meth at a dark chapter in his life and Stefanie Graf was a way larger part of his life than you can imagine. Simmons details MJ's baseball "sabbatical" and just about every other possible thing that happened in the NBA. Plus he includes his "runner up" best cocaine story and best cocaine story in NBA history. Gold...pure gold. Edge - Simmons

Intangibles: Agassi has written a book that forces the reader to take a look in the mirror and reflect on their own life. It is truly a life changing book, and it rightfully deserves consideration for the Pulitzer prize. Simmons has written a 700 page book on the NBA that includes a "What if..." chapter, a "Wine Cellar team" chapter and paragraphs such as "Imagine a guy was in prison and the warden told him if he grabbed 40 rebounds in 40 minutes he could be paroled. That was how hard Moses Malone hit the glass." Unfailingly insightful and funny. Edge - Simmons (by a freaking inch!)

So ultimately, Simmons takes it...but not by much.

The Ballad of Bernie Gunther

How is it that Philip Kerr continues to ascend my list of top authors as easily as he does?
He is six books into his watershed Bernie Gunther series with a 7th due in October 2010. The first three books in the series (March Violets, A Pale Criminal, A German Requiem) were written in the late 80's and early 90's and were later collected into a one volume edition titled Berlin Noir. These books were tough, tough noir so hard it made your stomach ache like you had been chewing on broken glass. Kerr's books were so taut and twisty they released slowly like a coiled cobra.
One of the reasons the books were so effective was Kerr's lean and powerful prose which was aided immensely by the historical depth of the Nazi era. Of course it helped that his character, Bernie Gunther is a former German police detective with the morality of a pirate. Gunther gets to witness the Nazi depravity before, during and after the war.
Seventeen years after the trilogy finished, with a solid closure, Kerr resurrected Gunther with a novel (The One From the Other) so unbelievable and perfect that it easily kept pace with the other novels and in some ways expanded and surpassed them. This was Kerr writing retrospectively about the Holocaust and showing a new side of the history of his character during the war (during which he has not set a book).
A year later he put out A Quiet Flame which detailed a piece of history Argentina hopes will be relegated to few memories. The novel was set amid postwar decadence in the South American country and it is a slam bang thriller so well written it made my list of 2009's Best Books.
The sixth book If the Dead Rise Not fills in many of the gaps in Bernie's life and adds a worthy new chapter. Kerr's willingness to experiment with new narrative structures (such as two different time periods) has kept the series from growing stagnant or stale.
This sixth book, more than any other, further characterizes Gunther as a moral quandry. He is a reluctant hero, a man trapped by the flow of a dark piece of history and condemned to a brutal existence. He dishes it out - but has to take a fair amount too. And, he is forced to commit horrific acts that are morally reprehensible but understandable given his contemporaries. Gunther is a hero for his time, when a hero was a dark knight who had to be just as brutal as the Nazi's in order to battle them. More than any other character in noir, Gunther is a man haunted and hunted by his past. He is trapped by the sins of an entire nation but shows time and again how much of a surviver he is, as well as a stunning ability to overcome trouble.
One of the more brilliant twists Kerr devised was forcing his character to leave Germany and move to South America with the people he despised most. For the character it was shattering moment, and continues his Dante-like journey through the stages of hell. Kerr leaves the morality of his character's choices up to the reader and that is why the series is so successful.
It is my theory Kerr has written the seven definitive books on the Nazi era. He has gone far and beyond most histories and gives the reader a true feeling of what Nazi Germany (and Argentina....) were like.

Book #25

The Book of Basketball by Bill Simmons offers more than just a completely in-depth look at the NBA from birth to present: it is quite simply the funniest book I have ever read. Not just funny, but burst-out-laughing-uncontrollably at least once a page. A couple of times I simply could not stop laughing for a half hour.
It is that funny.
However, as I said before, Simmons also offers the most comprehensive and astounding book yet written on the NBA. He weaves together a litany of pop-culture, NBA greats, awesome moments and random teams ("Best Bearded Team", "All Name Team") to make a stew of pure readabilty. You will devour this book and his witty references. Plus, I learned more about the NBA than I ever wanted and it made me love the game that much more.
Of course, the book is not without (Len) bias. Be warned Lakers fans, this will be tough to get through yet it is ultimately a worthwhile and rewarding read, bookended by Simmon's Hall of Fame Pyramid and arguments on who is the greatest of all time. While the answer may not be a mystery to many - SPOILER ALERT it's MJ - the reasons why and who comes before him are nonetheless compelling.
Highly recommended for sports fans and non fans alike. If you only pick up one book on the NBA in your lifetime, this is without a doubt the one to read.

The Redemption of...Steve Alten?!

Is Steve Alten actually evolving into a decent writer? Steve Alten, you ask - the same dude who wrote The Trench? Yes, the same Steve Alten who wrote Meg 4: Hell's Aquarium (which meant that not only did he write Meg 4 but he also had to write Meg 3: Primal Waters to get there) is potentially becoming a better writer.

Really?

Really.

Alten, of course, is the guy best known for the book pictured above: Meg which was a slam bang ride of a thriller which featured a sixty-foot shark as the protagonist. This novel was a best selling phenomenon for several reasons:

1) It was nearly impossible to put down. This was Jaws for the next generation and made people scared to go in the water again. It was not exactly the most "literary" of novels, but I have seen worse and Alten's ability to create tension and a shattering conclusion was virtually unmatched.

2) This was Jurassic Park for the freaking ocean! The main character was a disgraced former Navy Deep Sea diver / paleontologist (wow, it was more believable then I remember) who spotted a Meg years before the main narrative and panicked, killing a sub team in the deep ocean. Naturally, he goes back to the Trench and is proven right and finds some redemption. The novel was also able to inform the wide variety of readers about the Marianas Trench, which even to this day remains mostly unexplored. Alten used this to create a fascinating lost world where literally anything - even a massive shark not seen since the bloody Jurassic period - could be waiting.

3) Finally, the book came out at the write time and the right time. It was able to capitalize on the summer reading season (when everyone reaches for a page turner) and also on the success of Jurassic Park the movie. Everyone wanted more prehistoric giants and this book, like it or not, delivered.

Of course, Alten was unable to sustain the massive amount of hype and went through several Meg movie options, never really finding the right spot for development (seriously, will someone just make this movie so we can pan it already!). Then, he rushed a sequel which was critically panned and had an even worse sales reception. He looked like a one hit wonder, doomed to James Rollins-esque obscurity.

Then something happened.

Alten seemingly decided not to write crap anymore. His next effort Domain was about the Mayan Doomsday propehecy of 2012. While, it was written on the level of Steinbeck, Alten's research and theories / predictions were staggeringly well thought out. Keep in mind this is the guy who wrote Meg and 4(?!) sequels. For him, Domain was a massive and potentially alienating novel. He showed no fear in moving away from his core base of fans and he should have been massively rewarded for it. Domain is a fascinating novel that works on more than just a simplistic sketch outline and included more history than most textbooks.

Naturally, Alten wrote a sequel: Resurrection (which explored the concept of the afterlife / religon), and then several Meg books.

Not helping my cause Steve, not at all...

However, just when he seemed ready once again to drift into obscurity Alten went all in with The Loch a book which dealt with the history of the Lochness Monster and theorized on what it may actually be. Alten had written another "creature feature" but this was a well documented and thoroughly researched book (seriously...this book has more info and more up to date facts than Scientific American) that was impossible to put down. (Currently it is being fast tracked for a movie). Yet, on a different level Alten also showed an increasing maturity as a writer - his characters were a littler deeper, his plot more thought out. The Loch, which I devoured in a couple of days, was a surprisingly good read that really opened my eyes to a lot of Scottish History that tends to be neglected.

At that point, Alten, although lacking huge success had the makings of a solid career. Unfortunately he went through publishers like Michael Jordan went through poker tables and did not have the steady consistency he needed.

It is borderline miraculous then that this next book was as...small sigh...good as it was. Actually. I love The Power of the Dog which detailed the history of the rise of the Mexican Drug Cartels and Alten's next book The Shell Game reads like the big oil version. It was a stunning book, again, deeply researched and his conclusions are incredibly insightful. Of course it does needs to be taken for what it is - a "thinking persons" thriller. That said, it was a harrowing, powerful and ultimately poignant read. I know, I know. It takes a "what if" we run out of oil scenario and turns it into a sprawling epic of corruption. Yes...sprawling epic. At this point in his career this is Alten's The Power of the Dog, he may never write another book as good, but you keep hoping he will.

Take the number of Amazon.com reviews for The Shell Game: currently 115 (all the one star reviews are attacks on Alten's his "biased, nonsense opinions" - as they are anti-republican...to say the least) and the overall rating stands at an average of 4.5 stars. That is pretty impressive and I implore you to read this book as it may not be a classic but it is a darn good read. You will learn something and you will enjoy it. (Please...please...please learn something and enjoy it!)

It is his next book, due out in October, titled Grim Reaper: End of Days that has me excited to read a Steve Alten book again. I know, I cannot believe I am writing this, yet here we are at the end of a very long post in which I have now convinced myself I am more of a Steve Alten fan then I originally thought.

Yet, this is also the guy who wrote Meg's 1 - 4 (Steve, just so we are clear, I will take back this entire freaking column if you write Meg 6).

Why, you may ask, am I so excited for this book by a man who has written 4 books about giant, prehistoric sharks? Check out the description on Alten's website which posits it as a cross between The Stand and Dante's Inferno (random, but I can actually see it working well), and has it as classic hero journey through good and evil and the nature of redemption. Oh, and the style is allegedly "reminiscent of (wait for it, wait for it...) Cormac McCarthy". Wow.

October suddenly cannot come fast enough...I am excited about a Steve Alten book.

Steve if you must turn this into a new series (and I am not so crazy about "end of days" being hitched to the title - just nitpicking) please make it a trilogy. We are in the midst of great trilogies and, let's face it, book #4 is always kind of a letdown.

Steve, just saw the cover for Meg 5 for the love of...

Article of the Year

Gareth Thomas is a rugby player and the subject of the best article I have read this year by SI's master Gary Smith. The article details Smith's reasons as to why Thomas is the World's Bravest Athlete - namely that he is:

"6'3 and 225 pounds of muscle. He's broken his nose five times, fractured both shoulders and lost eight teeth. He's drunk his mates under the table and brawled by their side. He's been named to the Welsh national rugby team more times than any other man. And, among active players in major professional team sports, he's...the only openly gay male athlete."

What follows is another example of why Gary Smith may just be the best magazine writer - possibly writer - of his generation. Time and again Smith has captivated his readers with a tale they did not even know they wanted to be told. His prose takes one beyond the game and his stories are so gripping, so powerfully haunting and so evocative that they are nearly impossible to put down.

He has written some good ones (about Mia Hamm, the last Yankee) and some great ones (about a black coach in Amish country, about a first nations basketball team, about Andre Agassi) and every time one of his stories appears in SI it is a cause for joy. He has two collections of stories out and his work has been featured in "The Best American Sportswriting" more times than any other author.

With this story, he lives up to his stellar reputation. He gets inside the torment Gareth Thomas faced in fighting to come out, and he asks why, no one in American professional sports has come out while they are still active. We live in a society that accepts everyone (except for a few fringe religious nuts...er elements) and it is time we got past our preconcieved notions of pro athletes.

Thank you again, Gary Smith, your writing is truly precious, not only for its entertainment, but also for its message.

The Princes of Crime

I have written things such as "Lehane is my Boston guy" or "Burke is my New Orleans guy" without really explaining the context, so, without further ado - my princes of crime writing.

Dennis Lehane (Boston) - As I have explained multiple times (he made my Mount Rushmore of Fiction Writers) Lehane is an absolute master of the literate thriller. His books are profound, thought-provoking and meaningful. Boston is a fabulous city to write noir about, with a rich crime tradition as one of America's most important city. Lehane owns this town.

George Pelecanos (DC) - Pelecanos owns DC like Lehane owns Boston - with a shotgun pressed right into the face of his reader. His books are character driven, urban noir, semi-western and all awesome. He has written the definitive DC Quartet about the disintegration of the city into one of the crime capitals and continues to write novels that defy the usual conventions.

David Peace (Yorkshire) - Peace is in the unique position of potentially owning two cities as he has also written books about Tokyo after the war. His works about the real life Yorkshire Ripper are so startling and powerfully drawn that one wishes to look away but cannot. A warning, however, The Red Riding Quartet must be read completely before reflecting upon as his themes cross years and books.

Philip Kerr (Berlin / South America) - Kerr actually owns two places, mostly because his character travels quite a bit. However, I would ultimately call him the best novelist about the Nazi era, as his noir detective (Bernie Gunther) transverses their deeds and misdeeds before and beyond World War II.

Ken Bruen (Ireland) - Bruen's "detective" (in the loosest possible terms) "solves" (in the loosest possible terms) crimes in Galway, Ireland. He is a boorish, brutal drunk who has messed up his entire life. The books detail this and more in a prose that feels like poetry.

James Lee Burke (New Orleans) - Burke has been working for many, many years to write about New Orleans and in some cases, Montana and to find the seedy undercurrent that crisscrosses the hazy Southern states. His works are infused with the sights, sounds, smells and feelings of Louisana. You do not read a Burke book - rather, you feel every single page. Haunting, poignant and beautiful.

A TV Show You Have To Watch

Having just finished the incredible third season of AMC's Mad Men it was high time I tried to explain the brilliance of a show that is way too underrated for its own good. This is not a show for the casual viewer: there is a complexity at work that is at times, completely daunting. It took me deep into the third season before I had the sudden ephiphany about how I could tie my love of Mad Men into a blog ostensibly about books. However, it can be done.
One of the best things about the show is how it ties literature into the dense, knotty plot. The plot by the way, is inherently too complicated to explain - it is about happiness, and the illusion of happiness seen through the eyes of a man who has everything. It is about his wife, and his office and it is about the 1960's.
Each season, and there have been three so far, the show displays one book that the characters are reading. Thematically, this book comes to represent many of the themes explored in the season. Without too many spoilers, they are Exodus by Leon Uris, Meditations in an Emergency by Frank O'Hara and The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbons. The first season is about a man waging an eventual conquest on all around him and carving his own place - a better place - within the world. The second season focuses on this man fighting to reconcile the two halves of his own self within the larger context of his own happiness as well as that of those around him. The third season details the slow and ultimate decline.
I cannot wait for the fourth season.
Mad Men is the kind of show that can be watched over and again and each season so far has contained a scene so utterly moving and powerful that it simply blows the viewer away. The third season in particular contains one of the single best episodes of television I have ever witnessed.
If you have not watched this show before, rent it, buy it, beg for it...but watch it, and watch it soon - the fourth season is about to start.