12 November 2007

PW's New Year's Eve


Pinky's Paperhaus pointed me towards Publisher's Weekly's Best Books of 2007 list, which officially came out a week ago. It sure seems early to do a year-end summary, but I would guess the book-trade weekly has probably had almost all its galleys for 2007 for at least a month now. (I'm basing that on my own experience as a PW reviewer, although it must be mentioned I had no input on this list and none of the books I reviewed made it.) They could have held it, but there's a certain cachet in being the first to put out a best-of list, even if it has a similar effect to seeing Christmas decorations before Halloween.

That said, I have read almost none of the books on this list. The further I read, the more I felt just glad to have heard of some of the books. I guess this means I have to turn in my book-blogger card, because clearly the Right Books are slipping through my grasp. (Just kidding. If I had pledged only to read books published in 2007 this year, I probably would have gotten through more, but that seems like an incredibly myopic way to read.) Now that you've all quit reading in disgust, there is one that I'm pretty sure will appear on my best-of list though: Tom McCarthy's REMAINDER, which is an incredible, surreal work of fiction I fear I will spoil for you if I write any more about it.

Make sure to scroll down to the bottom of the list and check out the special-consideration categories, too. If only there were more works in contention for the Best Book By Stephen Colbert category.

Image: Paul Harris Online

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