Best reads of 2021

[Daniel del Real]

Have you decided on the reading highlights of the year? If so, pour them here. Here are mine:

First six were definitely the best, and if I have to pick a book of the year I guess it would go to Mizumura.

?? Dương Thu Hương, Novel without a Name
?? Derek Walcott, Omeros
?? Mizumura Minae, A True Novel
?? Enchi Fumiko, Masks
?? Ibrahim al-Koni, Gold Dust
?? Tatiana Țîbuleac, The Summer my Mother got her Eyes Green
?? Yu Hua, Cries in the Drizzle
?? Maryse Condé, La Vie Sans Fards
?? Mishima Yukio, Acts of Worship & other short stories
?? Elio Vittorini, Conversazione in Sicilia
?? Dany Laferrière, L'Énigme du Retour
?? David Grossman, A Horse Walks into a Bar
?? Tanizaki Jun'ichirō, Love Stories
?? Al Berto, Uma Existência de Papel

 

[tiganeasca]

There were a few that it pained me enormously to strike off this list--it was a great year, all in all, at least for reading. And there were some I have enormous respect for but didn't love on a personal level (Bely, Petersburg or Woolf, To the Lighthouse). But overall (and I simply cannot choose a single favorite):

?? Jean Giono, Hill
?? Boris Pilnyak, Mother Earth and other stories
?? Lawrence Durrell, Justine
?? Caradog Prichard, One Moonlit Night
?? Philippe Claudel, Brodeck
?? D. O. Fagunwa, Forest of a Thousand Daemons
?? Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
?? Marcello Fois, Bloodlines
?? Anatole France, The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard
?? T.S. Pillai, Chemeen
?? O.V. Vijayan, The Legends of Khasak
?? Halldor Laxness, Independent People
?? Johannes Jensen, The Fall of the King
?? Malayatoor Ramakrishnan, Roots

(The order is purely chronological with the most recent on top.)

 

[ministerpumpkin]

Just a clean Top Five in alphabetical order:

?? Thomas Bernhard -- Woodcutters (1984)
?? Gustave Flaubert -- Bouvard and Pecuchet (1881)
?? Andre Gide -- Marshlands (1895)
?? Henry James -- The Ivory Tower (1917)
?? Jules Michelet -- The Sea (1861)

Hope everyone has a decent 2022!

 

[kpjayan]

There were a few that it pained me enormously to strike off this list--it was a great year, all in all, at least for reading. And there were some I have enormous respect for but didn't love on a personal level (Bely, Petersburg or Woolf, To the Lighthouse). But overall (and I simply cannot choose a single favorite):

?? T.S. Pillai, Chemeen
?? O.V. Vijayan, The Legends of Khasak
?? Malayatoor Ramakrishnan, Roots

(The order is purely chronological with the most recent on top.)

Yay! 3 books from Malayalam.. I'm readying my next set of books recommendations

 

[kpjayan]

Here we go, in no particular order

?? Dino Buzzati - Tartar Steppe
?? Hasan Manzar - End of Human history
?? Various - The Showa Anthology :Modern Japanese Short Stories
?? Ibrahim Al-Koni - Gold Dust
?? Vasily Grossman - Stalingrad
?? Stendhal - The Charterhouse of Parma
?? Allain Robbe Grille - Jealousy
?? Sophocles - Complete Plays
?? Kumau Brathwaite - Born to Slow Horses
?? Adolfo Bioy Casares - Invention of Morel
?? Jose Saramago - Blindness

 

[tiganeasca]

Here we go, in no particular order

?? Dino Buzzati - Tartar Steppe
?? Hasan Manzar - End of Human history
?? Various - The Showa Anthology :Modern Japanese Short Stories
?? Ibrahim Al-Koni - Gold Dust
?? Vasily Grossman - Stalingrad
?? Stendhal - The Charterhouse of Parma
?? Allain Robbe Grille - Jealousy
?? Sophocles - Complete Plays
?? Kumau Brathwaite - Born to Slow Horses
?? Adolfo Bioy Casares - Invention of Morel
?? Jose Saramago - Blindness

Just goes to show: the Buzzati is one of my all-time favorites but I struggled with Bioy Casares. Grossman is on my list this year too and since I read The Red and the Black in 2021, I suppose Charterhouse is due. And I wonder if al-Koni's time is coming.... I hope so.

 

[Verkhovensky]

I gave 5 5* ratings on GoodReads this year (out of 50 books read) and in no particular order, here there are:

?? Max Frisch, Homo Faber
?? Emmanuel Carrere, The Kingdom
?? Emmanuel Carrere, The Adversary
?? Alice Munro, Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage
?? Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

Also five honourable mentions (4,5 stars)

?? Alexander Bely, Petersburg
?? Chigozie Obioma, The Fishermen
?? Harry Mulisch, The Assault
?? Phillipe Claudel, Grey Souls
?? Julian Barnes, Flaubert's Parrot

 

[Leseratte]

2021 was a particular good reading year, as I noticed only when I looked the books up I read.

My favorite book:
??The Books of Jacob- OlgaTokarczuk
The second favorite:
??The eighth Life(for Brilka)-Nino Haratischwili

In chronological order:
??Machandel-Regina Scheer
??On Getting Up: Tales of a Life-Helga Schubert
??Heimkehr(Coming home?)-Wolfgang Büscher
??Dreams in a Time of War: a Childhood Memoir - Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o
??Tyll-Daniel Kehlmann
??Sweet Days of Discipline-Fleur Jaeggy
?? A whole Life- Robert Seethaler
??Die Kinder von Hoy-Grit Lemke

 

[Leemo]

Lots of new books to me in these lists!

Here's my favourites of the year in order of most recently read:

?? Halldor Laxness - Wayward Heroes [Gerpla]
?? Gerald Murnane - Velvet Waters
?? Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Idiot
??/?? Joseph Roth - Job: The Story of a Simple Man
?? Thomas Mann - Death in Venice and Other Stories
?? Ernest Hemingway - The Old Man and the Sea
?? Roberto Bolano - Monsieur Pain
?? Alice Munro - Who Do You Think You Are?
?? Ismail Kadare - Broken April
?? Flann O'Brien - The Third Policeman
?? Doris Lessing - The Fifth Child
?? Laszlo Krasznahorkai - Satantango
?? Dazai Osamu - No Longer Human

And a couple Non-Fictions:
?? John Berger - A Seventh Man
?? John Ralston Saul - The Doubter's Companion

 

[Cleanthess]

There were a few that it pained me enormously to strike off this list--it was a great year, all in all, at least for reading. And there were some I have enormous respect for but didn't love on a personal level (Bely, Petersburg or Woolf, To the Lighthouse). But overall (and I simply cannot choose a single favorite):

?? Jean Giono, Hill
?? Boris Pilnyak, Mother Earth and other stories
?? Lawrence Durrell, Justine
?? Caradog Prichard, One Moonlit Night
?? Philippe Claudel, Brodeck
?? D. O. Fagunwa, Forest of a Thousand Daemons
?? Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
?? Marcello Fois, Bloodlines
?? Anatole France, The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard
?? T.S. Pillai, Chemeen
?? O.V. Vijayan, The Legends of Khasak
?? Halldor Laxness, Independent People
?? Johannes Jensen, The Fall of the King
?? Malayatoor Ramakrishnan, Roots

(The order is purely chronological with the most recent on top.)

I also loved France's The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard. TCoSB taken as a trilogy together with France's other two books on memory, Little Pierre and Pierre Noziere is one of my 100 favorite books written before 1940.
As an afterthought, though.

 

[Benny Profane]

Top 5:

?? Marcel Proust - In Search of Lost Time;
?? Roger Martin Du Gard - The Thibaults;
?? Hermann Broch - The Sleepwalkers;
?? Arthur Schnitzler - The Road Into The Open;
?? Max Frisch, Homo Faber

Happy New Year, guys!

 

[alik-vit]

My top (in chronological order):

Francois Mauriac, Le Sagouin
Octavio Paz, Sor Juana: Her life and her world
Louise Gluck, Vita Nova
Adam Zagajewski, Without end: new and selected poems
David Grossman, See under "Love"
Vidia S. Naipaul, The enigma of arrival (reread and after 17 years it's still perfect)
David Grossman, Falling out of time
Marguerite Duras, L'Homme atlantique
David Grossman, Be my knife
Zoe Wicomb, David's Story
Cristina Peri Rossi, The ship of fools

And indeed - happy new year and thanks for this amazing company!

 

[Leseratte]

Lots of new books to me in these lists!

Here's my favourites of the year in order of most recently read:

?? Halldor Laxness - Wayward Heroes [Gerpla]
?? Gerald Murnane - Velvet Waters
??Fyodor Dostoevsky - The Idiot
??/??Joseph Roth - Job: The Story of a Simple Man
??Thomas Mann - Death in Venice and Other Stories
??Ernest Hemingway - The Old Man and the Sea
??Roberto Bolano - Monsieur Pain
?? Alice Munro - Who Do You Think You Are?
??Ismail Kadare - Broken April
??Flann O'Brien - The Third Policeman
??Doris Lessing - The Fifth Child
??Laszlo Krasznahorkai - Satantango
??Dazai Osamu - No Longer Human

And a couple Non-Fictions:
??John Berger - A Seventh Man
??John Ralston Saul - The Doubter's Companion

The Idiot is an all time favorite!

 

[Johnny]

My top (in chronological order):

Francois Mauriac, Le Sagouin
Octavio Paz, Sor Juana: Her life and her world
Louise Gluck, Vita Nova
Adam Zagajewski, Without end: new and selected poems
David Grossman, See under "Love"
Vidia S. Naipaul, The enigma of arrival (reread and after 17 years it's still perfect)
David Grossman, Falling out of time
Marguerite Duras, L'Homme atlantique
David Grossman, Be my knife
Zoe Wicomb, David's Story
Cristina Peri Rossi, The ship of fools

And indeed - happy new year and thanks for this amazing company!

Agree with Naipaul The Enigma of Arrival, a beautiful perfect book.

 

[Cleanthess]

2020 and 2021 look like a blurry slurry in my memory. I cannot really tell apart books read in one year from those read in the other; so, I'll do a double top 10 to account for two years, listed haiku style 7-5-7, grouped by genre.

7 Fiction
?? The Books of Jacob - OlgaTokarczuk
?? Be as Children - Vladimir Sharov
?? Damnable Tales: A Folk Horror Anthology - Richard Wells
??/?? Sandra and Woo - Oliver Knörzer and Powree
?? Complete Short Stories - Clarice Lispector
?? Kaiki, Cuentos de Terror - Various
?? The Complete Frank - Jim Woodring

5 Non Fiction
?? L'Homme aux trois lettres - Pascal Quignard
?? Garder tout en composant tout - Henry de Montherlant
?? J’ai quelque chose à dire. Et c’est très court - Louis Scutenaire (an anthology of his inscriptions)
?? The Notes: or On Non-premature Reconciliation - Ludwig Hohl
?? Le vol du vampire. Notes de lecture - Michel Tournier

7 Poetry

Miel y Hiel (Selected Poems translated by Ernesto Busto) - Catullus, Horace, Martial
?? Collected Poems - Takuboku Ishikawa
?? Toda Poesia - Paulo Leminski
?? Alma, que sirves para todo, Selected Poems - Marin Sorescu
?? Acts of Love, Ancient Greek Poetry from Aphrodite's Garden - George Economou, translator
?? Rituel d'emportement, Complete Poems - Marie-Claire Bancquart
?? The Roads Have Come to an End Now, Selected Poems - Rolf Jacobsen
?? The Night of Akhenaton, Selected Poems - Agnes Nemes Nagy

 

[Leseratte]

2020 and 2021 look like a blurry slurry in my memory. I cannot really tell apart books read in one year from those read in the other; so, I'll do a double top 10 to account for two years, listed haiku style 7-5-7, grouped by genre.

7 Fiction
?? The Books of Jacob - OlgaTokarczuk
?? Be as Children - Vladimir Sharov
?? Damnable Tales: A Folk Horror Anthology - Richard Wells
??/?? Sandra and Woo - Oliver Knörzer and Powree
?? Complete Short Stories - Clarice Lispector
?? Kaiki, Cuentos de Terror - Various
?? The Complete Frank - Jim Woodring

5 Non Fiction
?? L'Homme aux trois lettres - Pascal Quignard
?? Garder tout en composant tout - Henry de Montherlant
?? J’ai quelque chose à dire. Et c’est très court - Louis Scutenaire (an anthology of his inscriptions)
?? The Notes: or On Non-premature Reconciliation - Ludwig Hohl
?? Le vol du vampire. Notes de lecture - Michel Tournier

7 Poetry

Miel y Hiel (Selected Poems translated by Ernesto Busto) - Catullus, Horace, Martial
?? Collected Poems - Takuboku Ishikawa
?? Toda Poesia - Paulo Leminski
?? Alma, que sirves para todo, Selected Poems - Marin Sorescu
?? Acts of Love, Ancient Greek Poetry from Aphrodite's Garden - George Economou, translator
?? Rituel d'emportement, Complete Poems - Marie-Claire Bancquart
?? The Roads Have Come to an End Now, Selected Poems - Rolf Jacobsen
?? The Night of Akhenaton, Selected Poems - Agnes Nemes Nagy

Specially The Books of Jacob and Paulo Leminski!

 

[OverTheMountains]

I didn't read this year; not much, at least. And certainly not as much as I had hoped. But looking at what I did read I would still say it was a good year - with just enough standouts, at least one of which has moved into my all-time favourites list. The most long-legged in their impact, and those that have emerged as the best of a small pool, would be:

Ngugi Wa Thiong'o - Weep Not, Child
Angela Davis - Blues Legacy and Black Feminism
Can Xue - The Last Lover

and, the best book of the year:

Gabriel Garcia Marquez - The Autumn of the Patriarch.

A book which surprised me, shocked me, disgusted me, and taught me many new things. I'm saving my already old and well-worn copy on my shelf for as long as I have a shelf because it is nothing less than an incredible achievement of art. It is likely among the ten best books I haveever read.

 

[Ludus]

Gabriel Garcia Marquez - The Autumn of the Patriarch

My all time favorite from Gabo!

 

[Ludus]

???? Otredad - Claribel Alegría
????????? A House for Mr. Biswas - VS Naipaul
?? Another Day of Life - Ryszard Kapuściński
?? A General Theory of Oblivion - Agualusa
?? Death Shall be Dethroned - Helene Cixous
?? Morning and Evening - Jon Fosse
?? Sefarad - Antonio Muñoz Molina
?? My Native Land A4 - Ana Blandiana
?? Proleterka - Fleur Jaeggy
The Epic of Gilgamesh
?? Había mucha neblina o humo o no sé qué -Cristina Rivera Garza
???? La barca del tiempo - Cristina Peri Rossi
?? Vies Imaginaires / Le Croisade des enfants - Marcel Schwob
?? Anticitera, artefacto dentado - Aura García Junco
?? Arden las pérdidas - Antonio Gamoneda
?? Incident at the Shrine - Ben Okri
?? Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury (reread)
?? Noticias del imperio - Fernando del Paso (reread)

 

[redhead]

Best books:

?? Halldor Laxness, World Light

?? Jon Fosse, I is Another

?? Can Xue, Purple Puerilla

?? M. John Harrison, Viriconium

?? Susan Sontag, Against Interpretation


Below are some flawed books that stayed with me. I read some others I'm not listing that I thought were technically better than them, but these left a bigger impact. I guess you could say they're not the best but they are among my favorites of the year.

?? M. John Harrison, Parietal Games

?? Olav Hauge, Luminous Spaces

?? Stephen Dixon, I.

?? Peter Handke, Innerworld of the Outerworld of the Innerworld

?? Kobo Abe, The Ruined Map

And I read a decent amount of Mark Fisher this year. No one text really sticks out, but I just wanted to mention him on my "best of" list.