Books of the Year - 2010

Amazon.com has once again released their list of The Best Books of 2010 so it seems more than appropriate to release my 2010 list. Like last year, this list will contain the good and the bad and will be expanded with a whole plethora of new catergories.

Now, without further ado - the 2010 Books of the Year

The Clive Cussler Award (Best Page Turner)

Fiction: The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly - As I just recently wrote, this book got me through a weekend on the couch when I was sick. More complex and twisty than Connelly's usual offerings you will be put it down and pick it up a minute later.

Non-Fiction: Boys Will Be Boys by Jeff Pearlman - An examination of the 1990's Cowboys Dynasty, this book gets into the deep and the dirty secrets of the one of the best football teams of all time. Pearlman draws you into the characters who experience ridiculous highs and crashing lows before finding, in the most unlikely of times, redemption.

The James Patterson Award (Most Disappointing Books)

3. Dark Matter by Philip Kerr - The only time I have branched off and read a book by Kerr other than his phenomenal Bernie Gunther series. It will also be the last time. I understand what Kerr was trying to do; turn Isaac Newton into Sherlock Holmes, but the execution is off. Boring is a word I never figured I would associate with Kerr's writing but there you go.

2. Iron River by T Jefferson Parker - I really enjoyed the first book is his Charlie Parker trilogy and the second was a decent read. In this novel, however, Parker tried to be James Lee Burke. The main problem? No one can be Lee Burke but Lee Burke. This one had so much promise but ultimately fell apart under metaphysical circumstances that made no sense.

1. The Bodies Left Behind by Jefferey Deaver - Deaver's books are good for one thing: the jaw dropping twists and turns they take. In this one though, (which, admittedly I read after watching Inception) the "patented" twists were so telegraphed I had figured out the entire plot four pages in. Terrible, sloppy work from someone who has done much better.

Bill Simmons Award (Best Sports Book)

2. Bringing the Heat by Mark Bowden - A great portrait of the 1992 Philly Eagles, Bowden gets inside the world of Pro Football and his work is illuminating, well written and touching.

1. The Book of Basketball / Now I Can Die in Peace by Bill Simmons - Two of the best books I read this year.

Jon Krakauer Award (Best Non-fiction)

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson - As advertised; I learned more from this book (and I had the illustrated version) than I did in 12 years of school. The best part? It is a page-turner.

Gary Smith Award (Best Article)

"Bleed Through" by Charles Bowden GQ September 2010 - One of the first articles to examine the impact of the Mexican Cartel Wars on Texas, this article is chilling, haunting and a very terrifying reading experience.

David Simon Award (Smartest Book)

The Glass Rainbow by James Lee Burke - A potential series swan song? Burke certainly throws all of his skills into one of the best final chapters of his career.

Books of the Year

5B. The Red Riding Quartet by David Peace - A dark, extreme noir ride through the years 1974 - 1983 in Yorkshire. Centered around the infamous "Yorkshire Ripper" Case, the books are a deep expose of police corruption and the impact of violence. A towering literary achievement and the final pages of voulme four will leave the reader completely staggered. Powerful stuff.

5A. The Spy Who Came in From the Cold by John LeCarre - The best spy novel of all time. Less is more for LeCarre and here is a taut, minimalist masterpiece about a deeply conflicted spy who desperately wants out.

4. A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson - So full of interesting information your head may explode when you read it. My favourite part? Calling "Darwin's singular notion" the greatest idea anyone has ever had in the history of the world.

3A. LA Confidential by James Ellroy - The plot is so brilliantly convoluted that it makes the movie look like about as complex as the Lion King. When the villain is finally revealed, the punch is so powerful you may drop the book.

3. Now I Can Die in Peace by Bill Simmons - A look at the Boston Red Sox and their ultimate title journey through the microcosm of the movie The Shawshank Redemption. The most-apt comparison? 1986 was like the two years Andy spent being abused by "the sisters". Absolutely hilarious and rightly deserving of the accolade: the "Moby Dick of Red Sox books".

2. The Passage by Justin Cronin - Long, sprawling and at times there are wasted words. However, Cronin's dystopian future is so poignent and harrowing that it makes up for the slight (100 page) drag in the middle. A page-turner that means so much more then the words on the page, this is a book that will stick with you for some time.

1. Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurty - This is a Pantheon-level book (one of the best ever) and as a novel is absolutely stone brilliant. McMurty's characters are so beautifully drawn that their long (900+ page) journey could easily have been 900 pages longer. A singular achievement.

Author of the Year: Bill Simmons

Between his books The Book of Basketball, Now I Can Die in Peace and his columns and his podcasts, no one kept me better entertained this year. Truly, no other author was even really in contention once I read his incredible and hilarious book on the history of the NBA. He reignited a long dormant love of Sports books and is without a doubt my author of the year.

Looking Ahead - 2011's Most Anticipated Books

World War Z by Max Brooks - Supposedly the best zombie novel around, combining the best of horror and social commentary.

Fall of Giants by Ken Follett - Always a solid author, this one starts a new trilogy.

The Tiger by John Valient - A book about a tiger, hunting men in Siberia? I am in.

The Underground Empire by James Mills - Discovered in a used bookstore, this is a book from the 80's that tried to examine the full scope of the Drug Empires that have taken control of our world.

The Breaks of the Game by David Halberstam - Widely considered the best sports book of all time.

In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson - His best book The Devil in the White City and its follow up Thunderstruck were great. No reason this one, set in Nazi Germany should be any different.

The Lincoln Lawyer

Michael Connelly is best known for his Harry Bosch mysteries but The Lincoln Lawyer was the first book he has written that I have truly enjoyed. Other books in his continuing series tend to be "slightly preposterous" and not dark or gritty enough for my tastes. I read The Lincoln Lawyer while I was sick and it got me through two days of not wanting to get off the couch. This book is nearly impossible to put down and was perfectly plotted with genuinely surprising twists and turns. The characters are not stock standard or easy to pin down and protagonist Mickey Haller is a moral mess of a defense attorney who only fears defending a "truly" innocent client.

A great read, fast paced and complex enough to satisfy even the snobbiest of readers looking for something light.

Other news:

Watch for my Books of the Year column in the next couple of weeks. I have read more than 60 books this year and the list will be a compendium of The Best, The Worst and will include my choice for Author of the Year.

The 1st Annual Books of the Year Awards

This has been a great year for books; and in the spirit of Amazon.com issuing their Best of 2009 already, I decided to get on the bandwagon and release mine. I have read some great books this year and I have read some not so great books. Here are the good, the bad and the 5 best books I have read this year.

The Clive Cussler Award (The "I Could Not Put it Down" Award):

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

This book was a masterful thriller that twisted, turned and finally had the reader spinning in complete circles. It keeps you from truly placing a label on it by being so many different books crammed into one thrilling package - a thriller, a serial killer mystery, industrial espionage and a straight up whodunnit. Terrific writing, and I have heard the second in the series is as good, if not better.

The David Simon Award (The "Smartest Book" Award):

The Things they Carried by Tim O'Brien

A masterful blend of fact and fiction that plays off the darkness of Vietnam while also taking a metaphysical view on storytelling itself. Not to mention the fact it makes you want to keep reading it incessantly...without any pause. A personal favorite portion - when O'Brien tells you about war stories; how they are never heroic and how a true war story makes you feel sick afterwards. Compelling, vivid and the rare book that truly deserves the handle: masterpiece.

The James Patterson Award (The "Worst Book I read this Year" Award):

Thug Life by Sanyika Shakur

To be honest I only read 100 pages but you can get a sense of a book in 100 pages. I loved Monster by Shakur, it was a book that changed my life. Unfortunately, lightening only struck once for this reformed gangbanger. Atrocious does not begin to describe this text. Not only was this the worst book I attempted to read this year, it definitely falls into my top ten worst books I have read in my life. It was that bad. Not recommended.

The Rick Reilly Award (The "Best Written Line of the Year" Award):

Tim O'Brien - The Things They Carried pg. 68

"A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If a story seems moral, do not believe it. If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie. There is no rectitude whatsoever. There is no virtue."

Michael Paterniti - "Never Forget" the opening of a haunting article about the shattered remenants left behind by the brutal Khmer Rouge.

"Once upon a time - 1975, actually, in Cambodia - there was a regime so evil that it created an antisociety where torture was currency and music, books and love were abolished. This regime ruled for four years and murdered nearly 2 million of its citizens, a quarter of the population. The pervasion was so extreme, the acts so savage, that three decades later, the country still finds itself reeling. Now, as the surviving leaders of the regime go to trial and unimaginable past rises again, we're left with this question: What took us so long to remember?"

The Top 5ish Book of the Year

5. Travels by Michael Crichton - Given that Crichton died recently, I figured he deserved a place on the list with one of his lesser known books. This book challenges the way you look at the world and is written as well as any of his previous thrillers. An autobiographical look at the world and the things in it we do not understand.

5A. A Quiet Flame by Philip Kerr - The fifth book in Kerr's series about former Nazi Bernie Gunther took the character to Argentina in 1950. As usual, he uncovers a trail of death and destruction he is powerless to stop. Powerfully written, haunting, hilarious, stunning and with twists that literally take your breath away, this is one of the best of the series and without a doubt one of the best written books of the year.

4. The Way of the Dog by Don Winslow - As I recently wrote, this examination of the growth of the Mexican drug cartels spirals into an epic saga wrought with the consequences of revenge. Expanding outward and yet intently focused inward, this book was quite simply incredible.

3. The Stand by Stephen King - Given our fears about H1N1 this book is very topical...except for that fact it was originally written in 1978 and revised/added to in 1990. King mentions swine flu and creates a horrific picture of a world devestated by a superflu and the battle of the survivors against an even worse evil. Thematic, allegorical and a triumph of modern literature, this is the best book King has written and, will likely ever write.

2. Generation Kill by Evan Wright - Firstly, any book in which I can draw parallels from HBO's The Wire is tops in my list. Secondly, this book forced me to completely reexamine my position on the Iraq conflict. I tried to ignore the books about the war that weighed down the history section but this book changed that for me. It takes the chaotic first few weeks of the conflict and shatters all you thought you knew about it. The author's final stand that we have abandoned a generation we sent off to do our dirty work is one of the most profound - and important - things I read this year.

1. American Tabloid by James Ellroy - For me, only one book could be number one this year. James Ellroy has created a book that is completely unlike any other out there. He strips language down to its brutal base and crafts a machine-gun style that spits out evocative prose that peppers the reader and says more with less. That is only the praise of his writing style. Plot wise, Ellroy takes the magnificently large canvass of American History in the Kennedy years...before he takes a sawed-off shotgun to it. His history turns on the dark undercurrents and goings on behind the scenes in the tumultuous times. His characters rise and fall along Shakespearean arcs that are indelibly complex and perfectly crafted. When each of the three main characters turns on the Kennedy Brothers, you know where Ellroy is headed...Novemember 22, 1963. This book also boasts one of my all-time favorite characters in print "Big" Pete Bondurant, a sadistic, ex-LAPD, mob killer who works tirelessly to create the invasion of Cuba - while also serving the CIA, Jimmy Hoffa and working as a Howard Hughes goon. Without a doubt this one of the best books I have ever read.