The Year in Review: What I've Read

As 2011 draws to a close, it's always a good time to look back think about what's happened - for me, the year has a lot to do with books. I joined the site Goodreads a few years ago. This site lets you track what you've read, and provides a social network to share what you've been reading. Living so far away from my family in New Zealand, it's been a great way to recommend books to each other. Additionally, it's useful for keeping track of which books you read and which ones you want to read. I don't know about you, but almost every time I finish a book, I suddenly forget the title of every book I want to read. Thus - keeping an archive on Goodreads.

What did you read in 2011? Which books do you recommend?

Reading in Rome

With a longer commute on the tube, 2011 has been a pretty good reading year for me. For the first time, I've started to take an interest in non-fiction. Plus I've been in an excellent book club for a year now, forcing me to read some books I would never pick up normally.



Books Read in 2011:

1. Bossypants, Tina Fey: This autobiography was amusing, but not laugh-out-loud hilarious. However, it does present what it means to be a woman in TV, and addresses the question of why there aren't more women comedians.
2. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion: A memoir of grieving, Joan Didion wrote this in the year that her husband died, followed by her daughter dying a few months later. 
3. Guns, Germs and Steel, Jared Diamond
4. One Day, David Nicholls: The narration follows a couple for one day each year, a nice concept. This book is all the rage in the UK, but I was underwhelmed in the end. A shame.
5. Our Man in Havana, Graham Green: Supposedly hilarious, this British farce follows a loser-Brit who lives in Cuba and is accidentally pulled into the secret service. One of the few times when the British-American cultural divide is a bit too big to cross for me.
6. Zeitoun, Dave Eggers: This dramatic true story recounts a Muslim-American family living through Hurrican Katrina. One of my favourite books this year!
7. Island Beneath the Sea, Isabel Allende: Based in the 1770's, Allende tells the story of a slave in the Caribbean. Not my favourite by Allende, but still worth a read.
8. The Blank Slate: the modern denial of human nature, Stephen Pinker:This is an excellent philosophical/scientific exploration into the nature vs nurture argument, which it closes definitively. Fascinating stuff!
9. The Finkler Question, Howard Jacobson:More depressing loser-literature about a sad Jewish man in London living an insignificant life.
10. 59 Seconds, Richard Wiseman
11. The Thousand Autumns of Jakob de Zoet, David Mitchell: A novel about the Dutch trading port in Japanin the 1700s. 
12. Moab is my Washpot, Stephen Fry: This autobiography of Stephen Fry was incredibly self-deprecating, but also is an interesting story of the boarding-school system in England.
13. Shadow of the Silk Road, Colin Thubron
14. Eating India: An Odyssey into the Food and Culture of the Land of Spices, Chitrita Banerji
15. Room, Emma Donoghue
16. The Long Song, Andrea Levy
17. We Need to Talk about Kevin, Lionel Shriver. This book was traumatising but still mesmerising. It explores the mind of the mother of a child who murders his classmates, and whether she is responsible for his actions. 
18. Lady Chatterley's Lover, DH Lawrence
19. Scar Tissue, Anthony Kiedis
20. So Much For That, Lionel Shriver
21. Stone in a Landslide, Maria Barbel
22. The Slap, Christos Tsiolkas
23. Moods of Future Joys, Alistair Humphreys
24. My Life in France, Julia Child