While on the desk at my vounteership a woman I was checking out books for asked me out of the blue, "What was the best fiction you read this year?" If I hadn't already been in a zombie like state I would still have had trouble coming up with a good answer for her. I admitted to her that I hadn't read much fiction that year, and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense to me. I don't read a lot of fiction. If I do I'm committed to a few "good" authors, or at least ones whose writing formulas I find hard to break free from. When I was younger it was Anne Rice, John Grisham, and most recently Lisa Gardner. I haven't been keeping up with any of those authors since as I became an English major and found myself reading more classic literature. In fact, the majority of my 6 ft. bookshelf is filled with classic novels such as Madame Bovary, Barry Lyndon and modern plays like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead and The Glass Menagerie. I've attempted to read books for the Manassas Book Club but find that I can't shove my YA top choices aside to finish the required reading. Currently I have "A Thousand Splendid Suns" sitting on my desk now.
I think my lack of response to this woman was attributed less to the fact that I don't read much fiction to the fact that I haven't read any fiction that blew me away this year The last jaw dropping excellent book I read was a science fiction books, Patrick Rothfuss The Name of the Wind. It requires a lot of time commitment to finish as it's practically LOTR length in one book. The most fun I had reading is attributed to author Jim Butcher's Dresden Files. So I think my tastes more lie with science fiction now. Stephen King's latest, Under the Dome, is also collecting cobwebs on my shelf. He'll probably write his next novel by the time I finish this one.
Which brings me back to the question which first began this post, what was ultimately the best piece of fiction you read this year? What stuck with you? What was it about that particular book that made it stick?
The top rated books on my librarything account are Mercedes Lackey's newest 500 kingdoms novel ("the Sleeping Beauty") and the audio book of "Nelson Mandela's Favorite African Folktales". The African Folktales was incredible because each tale was read by a different narrator - I almost certainly wouldn't have liked the print copy as well. I like Mercedes Lackey's 500 kingdoms series because it is full of wonderfully witty re-told fairytale characters.
ReplyDeleteDo you know if your patron was looking for readers advisory or just conversation? (Just curious. Our summer project at my public library was studying reader's advisory.)
Hey Kay,
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure what her inflection meant. She just said it out of the blue as I was checking her books out so I had assumed she was bored and slightly curious. I felt bad that I didn't really have an answer for her.
Thanks for your input!