22 books in all; just shows how much more time and energy I have these days! There's a distinctly sci-fi tilt to this year's reading. That's largely due to background reading for a game development project in the offing...sometime...I don't know when....A lot of gifts and recommendations too: more than a third of the books here have been recommended, loaned and/or given to me. What generous people I have around me! The skew is also very much toward fiction. I've never been much of a non-fiction reader; I tend to see non-fiction books as reference material. However, not all of these are pure fiction, and I've finally got back into the habit of reading poetry: one of last new year's resolutions fulfilled!
The Complete Alan Moore Future Shocks – utterly brilliant and illuminating collection shining a light on Moore’s extraordinary talent. This is much more frivolous and witty than the likes of The Watchmen and has the feel of a graphic novel version of J.G.Ballard or Kurt Vonnegut. There are also ideas lifted straight from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: not a criticism; more an observation. The varied art-work and consistently inspired writing are a joy to explore, not least for the way in which these little gems comment on humanity and our flaws and foibles.
The Complete Alan Moore Future Shocks – utterly brilliant and illuminating collection shining a light on Moore’s extraordinary talent. This is much more frivolous and witty than the likes of The Watchmen and has the feel of a graphic novel version of J.G.Ballard or Kurt Vonnegut. There are also ideas lifted straight from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: not a criticism; more an observation. The varied art-work and consistently inspired writing are a joy to explore, not least for the way in which these little gems comment on humanity and our flaws and foibles.
Game Audio by Aaron Marks – superbly written and comprehensive in its remit. This is the book that got me started with auraLAB Studios and focused my work for the first year. Having read it from front to back, I am confident that it will be a stalwart reference work of mine for many years to come.
The Eternal Golden Braid: Godel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter – A profound book, but not an easy read. I won’t claim to have understood all the formulae and mathematical stuff, but the way Hofstadter approaches questions of information and what it means for our existence allows you to follow his arguments without a degree in pure mathematics. Probably one of the most important books I will read in my life.
Doctor Who and the Green Death by Malcolm Hulke – I’ve enjoyed a lot of the Doctor Who episodes since David Tennant. I had this book knocking about and read it out of curiosity. It’s a few decades old, which shows, and it’s clearly written for the young reader. Curiosity satisfied; wouldn’t bother reading another one.
Fantastic Mr Fox – The first Dahl I read when I was quite young. When I saw that the film was being made I realised I could remember little of the story beyond having really enjoyed it. Reading it again as an adult, and parent, it was a delight. Can’t wait till Ellie’s a bit older so that I can read it to her.
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Vol I-V by Douglas Adams – One of those significant gaps in my personal lexicon. Unless you detest sci-fi of all kinds and have no sense of humour these books have to be read. Very funny, moving, profound, and replete in its observation of humans and the way we are, there is little to disappoint.
Ariel by Sylvia Plath – 2010 has marked my return, after too many years, to reading poetry regularly. Plath’s poetry leaps off the page and sears itself into your mind. This was Plath’s last collection and therefore reflects some uncomfortable questions of self-harm and presages of suicide, but the writing is poetry as it should be: distilling the language to its most efficient and intense form.
Logicomix by Papadimitriou – A graphic novel about the life of Bertrand Russell. Yea, I know, sounds a bit weird doesn’t it. It’s actually brilliant. Those not familiar with the graphic novel genre would be surprised by how deeply the book goes and I am left with a much clearer idea of the man behind ‘Principia Matematica’ and ‘A History of Western Philosophy’.
The Flanders Panel by Perez-Reverte – Sal picked this up for me from Borders when they were closing down: it has a chess theme and I like chess. It’s a murder mystery of a high calibre, not unlike Wilkie Collins in style; particularly when one considers the murderer as a protagonist. You don’t have to be a chess player to enjoy this novel, but it does add to the enjoyment as you try to solve the riddle of the chess position. This was an extremely clever and exciting novel with multiple threads, multiple mysteries, and spanning hundreds of years.
Tiger Tiger by Alfred Bester – This novel only went under the title ‘Tiger Tiger’ for a shortish time (my copy just happens to be from that period), but I think it is a much better title than the established ‘The Stars My Destination’. Claimed by some to be the most influential sci-fi novel of all time it is an extremely impressive work. I can certainly think of a whole raft of films that take ideas from this novel. Profound, disturbing, prescient, enormously clever: all adjectives appropriate to describing this novel. Also, like all great sci-fi, it goes beyond the genre to tackle greater, more universal and human questions. The central protagonist is a sort of Heathcliff anti-hero; but I would be much more afraid of Bester’s creation! This is possibly the best science-fiction novel I have read.
The Cyberiad by Stanislav Lem – Lem is the literary originator of ‘Solaris’, which is now so famous as a film; something of a ‘2001 Space Odyssey’ for the 21st Century. Lem however is about as typical a sci-fi writer as Douglas Adams. There is something Arthurian and chivalrous about these short stories and they are a delight to read.
The Robots of Dawn by Isaac Asimov – Another influential novel – on films such as ‘I Robot’ – this is a Chandleresque take on sci-fi, exploring some interesting questions of morality and what it means to be human
Mortal Engines by Stanislav Lem – Back to Lem with another collection of short stories. Some of the same characters are at the centre of this set of adventures, but the human-robot dialectic is more prevalent.
The Outward Urge by John Wyndham – I have been a Wyndham fan for many, many years. Those who just know him as the author of ‘The Day of the Triffids’ are missing out on the deeper resonances of Wyndham’s explorations. Wyndham consistently has something penetrating and original to say about the human condition, and this early, collaborative work is no exception.
The Good Soldier Svejk by Hasek – A birthday present from my great friend Konrad. This is, in many ways, a ‘Catch 22’ for World War I. Like Heller, Hasek builds a story of the minions of the WWI to highlight the futility and awful human waste of war. Brilliantly funny (sometimes reminiscent of Damon Runyan) and unabashedly scathing, Hasek sticks it to ‘the man’ like no-one else.
Night Passage by Robert B. Parker – If I ever need a breather from heavier reading or am laid up in bed poorly, there are two authors I typically turn to. One is Elmore Leonard; the other is Robert B. Parker. He is one of few writers worthy of mention in the same breath as Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett and seemingly more prolific than the two put together. I have read a stack of his Spencer novels, but this is the first I have read (and the first published) of the Jesse Stone books. Quite simply a great read.
Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse – One of those books I’ve meant to read for a long, long time. Hesse’s ‘The Glass Bead Game’ is one of the most important books I have read, in terms of its effect on my life; but Steppenwolf is probably the most famous. I read it a couple of months ago and it is still sinking into my consciousness now. Steppenwolf is an archetype of modern humanity; a profoundly flawed character, self-deluding, narcissistic, lost, tied up by the dichotomies of our existence, and therefore a harsh mirror of ourselves.
The Prophet by Khalil Ghibran – This book has been referred to in breathless superlatives, so it has sat on my shelf waiting to be read for many years. It is a short treatise (for lack of a better word) on how to live a Christian life. The teachings and ideas are not dissimilar from those of Jesus as I understand them to be. As such, if the ‘Godliness’ and ‘Christ-ness’ of the book is taken out, the message is an important one and is a very eloquent comment on how to live and love. Much of its message is no less relevant today than it was when written 100 yrs or so ago.
Cuentos de Posguerra by Antonio Ferrer – I like to try to read something in Spanish every year as it helps me to keep my second language more or less fluent. These are a strong set of Anti-Franco short stories exploring the post-war period in Spain at its most human level. The style is direct, tight and un-flowery, but the pathos, beauty, and tragedy are all the more powerful for it.
Carter Beats the Devil by Glen David Gold – Found this in a charity shop and thought I’d give it a try. A mostly fictional account of a magician during the time of Houdini, Gold’s debut novel is riveting, fiendishly clever, constantly surprising mystery. The complexity of the novel and the depth of characters harks back to Wilkie Collins at his best, but the pace is often more like that of a Chandler novel. This book is as clever, and uses as much sleight of hand, as the extraordinary illusions it occasionally describes.
Crow by Ted Hughes – This is contemporary poetry with a mythic ancestry going back thousands of years. Crow, the key protagonist of the collection, is God-like creature that seems to have burst out of our shared unconscious. As such it is not uncommon to feel like you are re-visiting some macabre dream when reading these poems. This is a primal, super-moral, collection of terrible beauty.
