Best Reads of 2012

These are the top ten books I read in 2012 (regardless of when they were published).


#1 - The Orphan Master's Son - Adam Johnson
(2012, novel/audiobook)

What I said about it in August: "It's a great book...  [but] all of the narrative juice is used up before the novel actually closes (about 90% of the way through to be vaguely specific). But I was transported, tempted and entertained. Definitely one of the best books I've consumed this year."

Turns out, time conceals all flaws when it comes to this novel. Certainly the most memorable novel I consumed this year. As always, Numbers 1 through 3 could come in any order depending on my mood.


#2 - True History of the Kelly Gang - Peter Carey
(2000, novel/audiobook)

What I said about it in October: "Yeah, this was a good book... The audiobook took a bit of getting used to as the narrator didn't go for much in the way of differentiating characters' voices in dialogue (and decided part way through to make Mary Hearn sound more Irish)...

"But there are advantages of receiving a text like THotKG aurally. Carey's Ned Kelly writes in a comma-less tidal wave, and with the audiobook you have no choice but to keep up with him. Carey's way of breaking up the narrative by describing the various packages that Kelly's account comes in (the conceit is that this true history is archived somewhere in Melbourne) is pretty canny. In fact, the whole thing is canny."


#3 - I Got His Blood on Me - Lawrence Patchett
2012, short stories, NZ)

I never blogged about my own thoughts on this collection, but here's what I said in a Dom Post column from September: "These days, most historical fiction being published in this country features a woman in a flowing dress on the cover, but Patchett's short stories mine a different vein. There are shipwrecks, marathon swimmers and battles between sealers and religious nuts. Costume dress is kept to a minimum.

"The present and the past are allowed to inhabit the same frame, whether it's the ghost of Maud Pember Reeves pestering a council clerk or a musket-wielding time-traveller appearing on the side of State Highway 1. Our past has never felt so exciting or accessible."

And 1: Here's my interview with Lawrence from June.


#4 - The Marriage Plot - Jeffrey Eugenides
(2012, novel/audiobook)

What I said about it in June: "I found myself popping my iPod on while doing the dishes or watering the garden, not just during my workday commute, which is always a good sign for my level of engagement with a book.

"For the first time in a while, the American Contemporary Social Realist Novel felt like a genre, and I don’t mean that disparagingly: it felt snug and comforting. Here was the entire spectrum of middle class white college kids in the early eighties (so not much of a spectrum, really) talking about Victorian novelists and literary theory and religion (at other times, the narrator quotes long passages from books on these topics)."

#5 - State of Wonder - Anne Patchett
(2011, novel/audiobook)

What I said about it in May: "My current audiobook is Ann Patchett’s State of Wonder, read by Hope Davis. Sadly, Ms Davis struggles with the Australian accent and the first third of the novel features two Australian characters. This small quibble aside, I’m enjoying the book..."

I didn't blog about this novel once I'd finished it, but it was one of the more memorable novels I read this year. Strong plot, clean, unobtrusive writing, with something unnerving running just below the surface.

#6 - Straight through from London: The Antipodes and Bounty Islands, New Zealand - Rowley Taylor
(2007, non-fiction, NZ)

Two years running my #6 spot has been taken by a non-fiction book that I came across while researching THE NOVEL (aka The Mannequin Makers). Taylor's book contains a great mix of general history, stunning colour photos and detailed appendices for those with a special interest in these islands. In particular, his log of every visit by vessels of the NZ Steamer Service was super helpful. 

#7 - The Bengal Engine's Mango Afterglow - Geoff Cochrane
(2012, poetry, NZ)

I promised a couple of times this year to write about Cochrane's latest collection (and James Brown's, which I brought and read at the same time). But I got busy finishing my novel and, truthfully, I didn't respond to The Bengal Engine's Mango Afterglow as strongly as I had the last few of Cochrane's collections. Several tropes felt recycled. Basho, Li Po and Tu Fu were back. The worksheets were now "Pinksheets" and we got eight of them.

So much of the power of 2010's The Worm in the Tequila derived from the wry twinning of poet's recent diagnosis with diabetes and his alcoholism. He'd also moved from Berhampore to Miramar. For a poet of footpaths and footnotes, this is like a whole new canvas - but it is unfair to expect your favourite poet to get a new disease or colonise a new patch of town with each new collection. 

Returning to The Bengal Engine a few months later -- and returning again after that and to Cochrane's other collections (Hypnic Jerks was on particularly high rotation for some reason) -- I got over my initial ambivalence and could see these poems for what they were: photographs from a poet who chooses sound over sight, punctuation over pixels.

#8 - Far from the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
(1874, novel/audiobook)

The oldest entry on this years list by a wide margin, here's what I had to say about it in October:  "I felt conditioned to enjoy Far From the Madding Crowd [because I'd recently read The Marriage Plot]. And I did like it.

"I like the way it starts with a very static description of 'Farmer Oak'. I like the way he's had his shot at Bathsheba Everdene early on and the scene where young George drives his sheep off the cliff, reducing him to a shepherd once more.

"...I liked Hardy's authorly theorising about men and women. The sort of things you could never really get away with in a book today. The sort of things quotation pages lap up, but has the habit of jolting the reader from the story..."

#9 - Love and Hydrogen - Jim Shepard
(2004, short stories)

This book features 22 short stories, a number of which appeared in Shepard’s first collection, Batting Against Castro. I really enjoyed Love and Hydrogen, but I’m just gonna come right out and say it: the book is too long...

"Love and Hydrogen may have too many stories, but it surely contains greatness. If not for ‘Ajax [is All About Attack]’, ‘Batting Against Castro’ might be the best sports short story I’ve read. ‘Love and Hydrogen’ might be the best ‘two men in love’ short story I’ve read (and it just so happens to take place on board the Hindenberg).

"The book is lousy with superlative, or near-superlative, stories. And for that reason, I can overlook the overstuffing, the lack of whole-ness, and proclaim it an awesome book."

#10 - How to be a Woman - Caitlin Moran
(2011, non-fiction)

The number ten spot this year was tightly contested with a number of novels (Arthur and George, The Keep, The Human Factor, The Art of Fielding and The Forrests) and non-fiction books (The Tipping Point, The Botany of Desire, A Place of My Own, Keith Richards' Life) that were good but not great reads. 

So my number ten spot goes to Moran's blend of autobiography and modern manifesto. 

Here's what I said about it in November: "I placed a reserve on this book months ago at the library and then when it was finally my time, I was reading it with the eyes of a father-to-be... [What I didn't say: we found out after I'd placed the reserve that we were going to have a girl, so the book took on greater importance].

"Caitlin Moran LIKES TO SHOUT IN CAPS. A LOT. But it works for her. When she wants to, she can turn a great, surprising phrase. Por ejemplo: "I feel embarrassed that she is now having to deal with our secret blackness. This is private. The admin of my soul."

"Interesting. Moderately enlightening. Always entertaining."

***

Target Practice

In my 2011 end of year reading summary, I noted the following goals for my reading in 2012:

• "Read 12 poetry collections (one a month)
• How'd I do? Only four new collections (not counting re-reading old collections). *Sad trumpet.* "Must try harder next year." 
• "Listen to 12 audiobooks, including at least four non-fiction books."
• How'd I do? Well, back in May I'd already reached the 12 and 4 mark. All up, I listened to 29 audiobooks, seven of which were non-fiction. A big healthy TICK.
• "Read at least twenty New Zealand books." 
• How'd I do? I only read 16. 80%. That's okay. Maybe next year. 
• "Read at least six Australian books of fiction." 
• How'd I do? Only three. *Sad trumpet*. There's always next year.
• "Read at least six books I already own"
• How'd I do? Depends if you count books I re-read. Pretty much everything I read this year I bought or got out of the library. So I'm giving myself a fail.

2012 was the first year I've ever consumed more audiobooks than physical books (29/26). I blogged about this a couple of times (early starts/tired eyes; most of my reading time being on the way to and from work). I think my Top 10 list this year is a bit middle brow, which is partly due to the fact only so many books I want to read are available as audiobooks. I'm gearing up to listen to Roberto Bolano's 2666 next year, but at 39 hours and 15 minutes, it's kinda daunting.

Some other stats:

What sort of books did I read? Here's a helpful camembert:

My response: More poetry needed. Novels can go down a bit, surely.

New or old-timey? Here's how the age of these books breaks down:

My response: More poetry needed. Novels can go down a bit, surely.

Where did they all come from? Here's how my year looked, based on the country of origin of the authors: 

My response: A bit vanilla. Again, audiobook availability may have something to do with this. Next year, I'll try and read books from at least 12 different countries, including 3 countries I've not read anything from before.

What were your best books of 2012? What country must I read in 2013? Lemme know!

Plus Ones / New Office / Yellow pohutukawa

So here we are. A new year, a new outlook on life. Mine is courtesy of the two week old screaming in the next room. I'm now a dab hand at changing nappies and ghosting through life with bloodshot eyes. Going back to work next Monday will be fun. Blogging, writing fiction and such luxuries may be infrequent this year. But hey, I have a daughter. Life is good.

*

*

This is where it all happens, part V 

The new arrival has neccisitated a reshuffle at the Cliff household. My brother moved out of the third bedroom a couple of months ago. Now I've moved my office into his old room and my old office is now the baby's room (for some reason I feel like stabbing people who call it a nursery, not sure why).

So this is what my writing space looks like these days...

I don't have the same view of the hills (and the seagulls going to and from the dump), but the deck's just there. On sunny, calm days I can pretend I'm writing al fresco.

As an added bonus, there's a fridge in the wardrobe which wasn't stocked when I took this photo but I can assure you it is now!

You can perve at my previous working spaces here (Edinburgh I), here (Edinburgh II), here (Houghton Bay) and here (Kingston I).

Nice surprises

We moved into this house in March 2012 and I only discovered that the pohutukawa above our place was a yellow one on 22 December.

It just so happened I was carrying my daughter inside for the first time, so it was rather auspicious.

A couple of days later I noticed the first head on our artichoke.

2012 was a fruitful year. One human baby delivered, one book baby handed to an editor, one house bought, one promotion and the promise of stuffed artichoke in a week or two.


Next steps

Tomorrow I'll post my annual Best Books I Read Last Year post. There's actually four books published in 2012 on the list, and two from 2011, so it's a bit more current than some other year's top tens.

Until tomorrow, you can read my lists for 2011, 2010 and 2008.

And the day after tomorrow I'll post a similar list for music. It'll be the first time I've done this, which says something for my consumption of new (to me) music, compared to the iTunes funk I'd gotten into in recent years. Mostly thanks to Spotify.

Till then, here's a picture of a windmill at Makara, looking north to Mana Island.

Abide with the handmaid’s desire: recent reading

I totted up my reading for the year this morning and there were about eight books jostling for the ninth and tenth spots on my top ten reads of the year. So I’ve decided to leave it another week and see if I don’t stumble on something that can leapfrog these ‘good, but’ books.

Until then, here’s what I’ve been reading of late...

Abide with me by Elizabeth Strout (novel, audiobook)

Strout’s 2006 novel reminded me of Marilynne Robinson’s 2004 novel Gilead: small town America in the 1950s, church ministers at their centre... But Abide with Me is colder, less lustrous. No doubt this is in part due to the contrast between Tyler Caskey’s New England Protestantism and John Ames’ Midwestern Congregationalism. In Strout’s next book, Olive Kitteridge, she finds a way to turn this bitterness into something compelling (see the title character; the novel in stories structure helps too), but Abide with Me is no Olive Kitteridge.

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood (novel, audiobook)

I spent the first half of this dystopian novel thinking: if this was really a dystopian novel something would be happening right now. Of course, the quid pro quo of a real dystopian novel (read: genre fiction) is less character development, less controlled writing (and less acclaim for its author). Things pick up eventually — we even get the staple of the genre: a long, thinly disguised information download to explain how things got so... dystopic. And hey, I wasn’t complaining. All up, I liked the book, but at this point in time I might have liked it more if the needle moved a notch or two back towards genre.

The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan (non-fiction, audiobook)

This is the second Pollan book I've listened to this year after A Place of My Own. This one delves into the history of the apple, the tulip, cannabis and the potato to tell the story of how humans have changed plants and how we might have actually been doing the plants’ bidding. There was plenty of interesting stuff (I didn’t know that all commercial apple varieties are grown from clones rather than from seed; I’d never heard of Tulipomania), though each section seemed to lose momentum three-quarters of the way in and the wheels were allowed to spin to fill the page-count or hammer home Pollan’s thesis. 

'Welcome to What Next, Population: You'

I’ve been MIA for the last couple of weeks. No, the baby hasn’t come yet (due date is tomorrow: 12/12/12, which was always too perfect to ever happen; I’m just hoping it doesn’t arrive too close to Christmas).

But I have delivered my other baby (for the second time).

Last Tuesday I sent The Mannequin Makers back to my publisher after spending two months making some tweaks, thanks to the useful feedback I received.

(In truth, I spent the first month watching Australian TV shows from the 1970s on YouTube -- Number 96, The Paul Hogan Show, The Great Temptation -- which was a research dead end. Even at this late stage, it isn’t always clear what belongs in a book and what doesn’t.)

Now the manuscript is with an editor who I’m excited to work with. Maybe it’s the masochist in me, but I enjoy this process of giving my baby over to someone else and letting them cover it in red ink, this game of manuscript tennis that eats up month after month. So long as you don’t forget who you are and what you set out to write, you’ll make the right changes, lessen the areas readers can get mired, lost, annoyed, or misled and amp up those moments you always thought should sing but maybe never quite nailed.

Every new version is an improvement on the last. Every new version is an improvement on the last. Every new version is an improvement on the last.

Maybe, by the end of this, we will have a book that some readers read through to the final page. Maybe some will like it, steal it from the library, name their children after its characters… Maybe it will annoy great swathes of people, get thrown across drawing rooms (I don’t think my target market has ‘drawing rooms’…), prompt lengthy ad hominen blog posts and snarky tweets. Maybe it will sink like a stone next year and I will be too busy fathering a real baby to notice. Maybe I will be juggling a real baby and another book-baby.

At this stage, I cannot say – not because I am being coy, but because I do not know.

I have entered the territory of ‘What Next?’ I have no map. I don’t speak the language here. Maybe I do, but I speak it poorly and when I ask the locals for directions they turn their noses up at me and walk away.

Deciding on your next project is a lot like your first week in Paris. You’re busy, confused, bumbling. Embarrassment is there to meet you at every turn. You’re surrounded by houses with plaques declaring the famous writers who’ve lived there. They’ve made their name, staked their claim. There’s nothing for you here, move along.

But eventually you will find that small café down an alley the other tourists don’t seem to notice. A place where the waiters humour your mangled recitation of the menu. A place to sit and let the world come to you. To get to know the regulars and the pigeons, the bitter kick of the coffee, the quiet hour after lunch when the wind toys with the morning’s newspapers.

Soon it will feel like home, this place. It will be knowable. Your knowledge of it will become comprehensive, then godlike, omniscient. You will use this knowledge to toy with the regulars, the pigeons, the headlines on the morning papers – petty games, but it keeps you occupied.

And then, one day, you are done with this place and it’s time to move on. It’s off to the airport and another foreign city, another busy, confused, bumbling week, or month or year.

As you lie on another lumpy hostel mattress, you tell yourself: next time I will read the travel guides in advance. Next time I’ll take language lessons beforehand. Next time I will draw up an itinerary and stick to it.

Or maybe you’ll just write short stories…

Recent everything

Recent reading

How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran (non-fiction)

I placed a reserve on this book months ago at the library and then when it was finally my time, I was reading it with the eyes of a father-to-be. I could have a daughter before the year is out (we've left the sex a mystery), and maybe I should have thought a little more about the F-word (feminism), but okay, here I am, reading this book about how to be a woman, surely that's a start!?

Caitlin Moran LIKES TO SHOUT IN CAPS. A LOT. But it works for her. When she wants to, she can turn a great, surprising phrase. Por ejemplo: "I feel embarrassed that she is now having to deal with our secret blackness. This is private. The admin of my soul."

A long-time Times columnist, Moran's prose beats at the columnist's furious, hummingbird heartbeat (though, if you've seen Moran talk, it's not just on the page).

Interesting. Moderately enlightening. Always entertaining.


Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman (short stories, audiobook)

Another audiobook read by the author. This one moderately remarkable since it's fiction and Gaiman is a very able 'voice artist'. His consistent performance 'at the mic' isn't quite matched by the stories 'on the page'. They're a mixed bag. 'A study in emerald', Gaiman's mash up of Arthur Conan Doyle and Ursula Le Guin opens the collection strongly, but there are a few too many shrugworthy stories and unclassifiable snippets (see: filler) for the book to hang together.


Also: the last six New Yorker Fiction podcasts. Still a fan. Magic.

And: Literary Consolation Prizes (via NY Times).


Recent listening

Lots of Ronnie James Dio (in his various bands) and Neil Young with his scungy hombres, Crazy Horse.




Recent home improvements

Installing a dishwasher (handy timesaver when baby arrives). Knocking down a wall in the garage (handy for getting baby in and out of the car). Fixing the guttering (nothing to do with baby, but it needed to be done).

(You can always tell the weekends when my mum and step-dad have come down to visit by all the things we manage to get done around the house. Power tools are useful! Know-how, even more so.)


Recent writing

* Slagging off Palmy, then explaining it how it's kind of a compliment.

* Improving The Mannequin Makers.

I have four pages of To-Dos, things like "Explain what happened to Colton" and "More reaction to the differences btwn imagined world (windo scheme) and real world -> the lies! the confusion! the freedom!"

Making changes at this late stage is always interesting. A small tweak can remove a big problem. Equally, a simple change in one chapter can require changes throughout the rest of the book (or at least, necessitate you reading the whole thing specifically looking for things that no longer fit this brave new world).

I'm supposed to give another version of the manuscript back on 1 December so it can be edited over Christmas. It'll happen. Balls to the wall as usual, but it'll happen (as long as the baby doesn't drop before then).

Advice to young (female) writers

I was recently searching through my emails for the name of someone and came across a request from Dolly magazine last year for a writing tip. Yes, that Dolly. The one that asks questions like Justin Bieber vs. Cody Simpson: Who has the hottest Instagram pics?

But they also, apparently, ask about writing. Which is cool. Since I can't imagine a magazine for male tweens even acknowledging the existence of fiction, let alone cultivating the dangerous, time-consuming, maddening urge to write.

Benevolent soul that I am, I offered Dolly three tips, but never saw the final article. Seeing this email, however, I did a quick Google search and managed to find it.

Here 'tis:

---

[TOP SECRET] WRITER Tips. (Dolly 1/9/2011, Issue 489, p144)

We conned some amazing authors into handing over their best writing tips. You can thank us when you're on the bestsellers list!

* "Set a designated writing time and stick to it. Think of it as a date with yourself, and honour it. Even a two-hour chunk once a week is great. Don't be afraid to use treats to get yourself through - I do. It might be some time online skimming my favourite blogs, or going out to get a coffee, or a new magazine after a particularly good session. (When I finish a whole book, I treat myself with something extraordinary. I shan't disclose what for fear of judgement.) (SHOES.)" - Zoe Foster, Amazing Face

* "Read, read, read - you learn so much from what other authors do, and you'll also find yourself inspired, challenged and eager to read more." - Georgia Blain, Closed For Winter

* "The reader should always be inside the head, or sitting on the shoulder, of the most interesting person in the room." - Craig Cliff, A Man Melting

* "Write as often as you can, even if nobody will ever read it. Every journal entry, essay, short story and blog post helps you finetune your skills," - Kelly Gardiner, Act Of Faith

---

The other two tips I offered were probably more useful (and less disputable):

• Finish things. A story's not much use without an ending.

• Set yourself challenges. Write a character's life story in 100 words. Write a story  using only dialogue. Write a story that goes backwards in time.The more constraints, the easier it is to fill those blank pages.

Now to work the fact I've been in Dolly into my author's bio...

It's in the eyes - a conversation with Ashleigh Young (tomorrow)

I haven't interviewed any short story writers for this blog for a while, but I have branched out. I've interviewed a poet (cum-essayist-blogger-editor). And to further my branching, the interview is going to be posted on the fledgling online litmag, Three Islands Magazine.

Apart from that, my interview with Ashleigh Young conforms to my usual 'email conversation' format.

I'll post a link to the full conversation when it's online tomorrow, but until then, here's a taster:

***

Me: You mentioned your blog (http://eyelashroaming.com/), which you maintain in addition to being a crack essayist and poet. How distinct are these forms for you? When you have an idea, do you instantly file it away under ‘Essay’ or ‘Poetry’ or ‘Blog post’? Do these forms ever invite each other round for nachos?

Ashleigh: They're not really on speaking terms. I have what feels like a different brain – or set of eyes – when I'm writing a poem as opposed to an essay or a blog post. 

If there's a subject I want to explore fairly rigorously, a subject that needs a wide landscape, it becomes an essay. But poems often have very uncertain beginnings. They start as fragments - usually single images or scenes, and can go through lots of different translations. 

Blog posts almost always start with me thinking, "Bloody hell, I haven't done a post for a while" and then trying to cobble something together. A few posts come from wanting to voice something that's been nagging at me for a while. A blog has a useful immediacy about it. But it does feel like an indulgence, sometimes, like something that Jonathan Franzen would hate, and I worry a bit about wearing out my welcome. I will try to cut it short before that happens.

***

 

[Update: You can now read the whole shebang here.]

If you're in Wellington tomorrow (Wednesday 1 Nov), Ashleigh's debut collection, Magnificent Moon, is launched at Unity Books on Willis Street at 6pm.

While we're treading these waters, it's worth mentioning the other great online arrival with an NZ/literary bent in 2012: The Pantograph Punch. They're producing consistently interesting stuff and managed to scoop me by a full 24 hours by posting Hera Lindsay Bird's interview with Ashleigh Young this morning. It's equally worth a look.

Another land, another land

I come from Palmerston North

So Thursday night at Te Manawa for the launch of Palmerston North City Council's Creative Giants website was interesting. Actually, it was pretty boring and felt like I had wasted my time driving up there to sit and listen to speeches and music for 90 minutes before the free wine started flowing... Which is interesting, but for the wrong reasons.

Better to just have stayed home, read James Brown and let the internet do the talking.


All foreigners ashore

It took a while, but my contributor's copy of Ein anderes Land: Short Storys aus Neuseeland arrived on Friday. (The original copy got sent to my old address and the new tenants are useless and lost/ate that package.)

My story, 'Copies', has transformed into 'Kopien'. This is the second of my stories to be translated after 'Offshore Service' got the Spanish treatment back in April.

Turns out my traveller's German is even shakier than my traveller's Spanish, so I can't make any pronouncements about the quality of the translation, but there is something distinctly unwelcoming to the uninitiated about all those big words...

The first sentence: "Das Leben ist eine Aneinanderreihung unvollkommener Wiederholungen." ("Life is a series of imperfect repetitions.")

There are, of course, some glorious words in the language.

Sammelband - omnibus
dunkles - dark
Ursprungsmoment - original moment
Papier geschnitten - papercut

As they say, you've got to take the Wiederholungens with the geschnittens.


True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey (novel, audiobook)

Yeah, this was a good book. A top ten read of 2012 most likely. The audiobook took a bit of getting used to as the narrator didn't go for much in the way of differentiating characters' voices in dialogue (and decided part way through to make Mary Hearn sound more Irish). I also spent too much time wondering how Australian Ned Kelly would actually sound.

But there are advantages of receiving a text like THotKG aurally. Carey's Ned Kelly writes in a comma-less tidal wave, and with the audiobook you have no choice but to keep up with him.

Carey's way of breaking up the narrative by describing the various packages that Kelly's account comes in (the conceit is that this true history is archived somewhere in Melbourne) is pretty canny. In fact, the whole thing is canny.

At the conclusion of the novel, there's an interview with Carey. The interviewer is a bit useless (at one point she asks Carey if he would like to talk about any of his other books and you can hear Carey think what an effing terrible question; she also mentions his busy schedule about 900 times: dude's a writer, he's got a spare half an hour to talk about himself) but Carey has plenty of interesting stuff to say.

In particular, I was struck by his description of the life of Ned Kelly, in the popular (Australian) consciousness as being a collection of well-known moments (the killings at Stringybark Creek, the robberies at Euroa and Jerilderie, the shootout at Glenrowan), but the rest of his life was a dark, or at least dimly-lit, field. Carey saw the task of his novel as illuminating these darker parts of Kelly's life while still bringing the story into the spotlight at the expected moments.