#828 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday January 3)
Good morning,
After six decades of books that represent decades in the 20th and early 21st centuries, here are the books of the 2010s. In past installments, I’ve suggested that decades have their logical beginnings and ends that often do not correspond neatly to ten-year blocks. The 2010s are no exception. In my opinion the decade clocks-in pretty neatly with the Global Financial Crisis that began in 2009 ending with the onset of the pandemic in early 2020 (and, of course, the election later that year). Here’s the list of fiction and non-fiction, mixed together:
THE 20-TEENS
Will you respect me less if I don’t include detailed information about some of these many books? I’m just pressed for time right now… But this is a great list.
· Deacon King Kong, by James McBride. An actual deacon, with the nickname “Sportscoat” is an ex-baseball coach in “projects” that resemble those of the author’s childhood. One day he decides to shoot one of his former players, who is dealing heroin. Then there are the gangsters trying to locate some World War II treasure. From the seemingly inexplicable act of violence by Sportscoat comes this story rich in characters of a world few of us inhabit—all of whom are trying to make ends meet.
· The Sympathizer, by Viet Thanh Nguyen. A Pulitzer Prize winner that sees the Vietnam war through Vietnamese eyes. The story of three boys at various sides of the conflict, which eventually takes them to Westminster, California and loyalists who refuse to accept the war is over.
· Homeland Elegies, by Ayad Akhtar. A complex story of a Pakistani immigrant to America, his family’s overlap with terrorists, his father’s obsessive Americanism and his struggles to fit in.
· The Glass Hotel, by Emily St. John Mandel. A great riff on a Madoff-like Ponzi scheme and how others, in smaller ways, steal, play-act, and deceive. Beautifully written.
· Manhattan Beach, by Jennifer Egan. One of the great writers of our time. This is a great historical novel that brings in 1942 New York and ends in the current decade. This is a book of bagmen in graft-filled New York (full disclosure: I have a great uncle who was a bag man for Mayor Walker in New York), deep sea diving, female empowerment, the remnants of the Depression and the war.
· A Visit From the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan. It won the Pulitzer. She’s great. I’m reading it again, before diving into her “sequel” to this novel.
· The Tiger’s Wife, by Tea Obreht
· The Flamethrowers, by Rachel Kushner. A solid B+.
· The Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead. A fantastical reimagining spin on the underground railroad to save runaway slaves. A real railroad in a fictional world earned the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
· The Orphan Master’s Son, by Adam Johnson. A Pulitzer Prize winner set in North Korea. A story of twisted state control and North Korea’s posturing with the West. Loved it.
· Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel. A moving meditation about the end of civilization in the wake of a pandemic that wipes out over 90% of the population…and civilization’s rebirth in the form of people building lives around a traveling symphony of actors. This was written BEFORE “our” pandemic.
· The Good Lord Bird, by James McBride. A brilliant story of the enigmatic John Brown (he of the raid on the Harper’s Ferry armory and, before that, fighting wars against slavery in Bleeding Kansas—the precursor to the Civil War).
· Exit West, by Mohsin Hamid. An immigration story amidst speculative fiction and doors that lead other places.
· All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr. Much has been written about this novel of two stories—a blind French girl and a German soldier in World War II—whose stories eventually converge.
· We Need to Talk About Kevin, by Lionel Shriver. How far does a parent’s love go? Is some evil just bred in the bone? The story of the mother of a boy she knows has serious sociopathy. Her guilt and dealing with the results of his actions are moving and troubling. Shriver is an underappreciated, brilliant author.
· The Mandibles, a Family, by Lionel Shriver. Loved this dystopian novel about the economic collapse of the U.S.
· Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies of a Silicon Valley Start-up, by John Carreyrou. The catastrophe that was Theranos, documented in the recent series, The Dropout. A great and frightening read about a colossal mountain of lies perpetrated on scientists, investors, the public and, tragically, patients, in the pursuit of power, prestige, and money.
· Frederick Douglass, Prophet of Freedom, by David W. Blight. Douglass was truly a great man. By the end of the 19th century, he was one of two men who could lay claim to have been heard speaking more than any other person (the other was Mark Twain). He had so much to say that he did it in his prolific writings, including multiple memoirs. Blight brings his illustrious life to light in this monumental and powerful biography
· How Democracies Die, by Steven Levitsky. What’s there to say? We may be living through the latest example…
· Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari.
· The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot. Science, medicine, scientific experimentation, race and class.
· Fear, by Bob Woodward and Rage, by Bob Woodward. One of his several books on the tumultuous, dangerous presidency of Mr. Trump.
· Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. A Nigerian girl who comes to America and must cope with the changes. Penguin Books says, “She is forced to navigate life in a new country, where she learns for the first time about racism and what it means to be black in a country insidiously defined by whiteness. Astutely told and gorgeously written – it’s also a love story between Ifemelu and her life’s love, Obinze, who she meets early on as a child in Nigeria – Americanah is a modern-day classic.”
· Gone Girl, by Gilian Flynn. Crime, mystery, romance, the nature of relationships, the media. It’s all here and was the subject of an excellent movie adaptation written by the author.
· The Martian, by Andy Weir. A great book and a great movie adaptation with Matt Damon. Really doesn’t fit neatly into a particular genre. I loved it.
· Unbroken, by Lauren Hillenbrand. The story of an Olympics athlete in World War II, serving as a bombardier. His plane crashes into the Pacific and the story then leads through a lonely time on a lifeboat and later in a Japanese prison camp. Seabiscuit is Hillenbrand’s follow-up about the famous racehorse.
· Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nahesi Coates. Read it just to learn what all the fuss is about.
· The Overstory, by Richard Powers. Okay, I haven’t read it but Jake loved it. It’s on the list to read soon…
· The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, by Siddharta Mukherjee. Brilliant on any number of fronts—biology, history, scientific method, empathy, medicine.
· Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin, by Tim Snider. The incredible Yale history professor on the horrors of mid-twentieth century Europe and the warnings for the future.
· The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson, by Robert A. Caro. One of the four volumes (so far) of the epic history of the era, the study of the man, and the analysis of the American democratic experiment and the workings of government.
· The Boys in the Boat. Another book I still need to read, suggested by Andrea and Karl Sussman; although I may see the movie first.
Have a great week,
Glenn