Treat Yourself 2011: Paperbacks For Days!

I love paperbacks as gifts. I think all the books I'm giving as gifts this year are paperbacks (don't worry, I won't spoil them in case anyone from my family is reading), and most of them hearken back to experiences I and the recipient have shared, jokes we have made or topics we both generally enjoy. In that sense it's really as fun to pick them out as to go down on Christmas morning and see what they've picked out for me. Because, while not materialistic in general, I really enjoy looking for gifts.

Here are some paperbacks I enjoyed in 2011 that you may find useful for your gifting needs:

For the current events addict taking a busman's holiday: I never get tired of talking about Leslie Chang's great investigative book FACTORY GIRLS, on China's marketing boom and its effects on young members of the population leaving their homes to chase new opportunities. I thought of it even more after reviewing (and liking) Tom Scocca's BEIJING WELCOMES YOU this August, in case you want to splurge on a hardcover and a paperback (for that special someone). Potential 2011 hooks: The death of Steve Jobs and the controversy over worker deaths in Apple factories abroad; the fact that three women were named as sharing the honor of the Nobel Peace Prize; American unemployment rates and the Republican presidential field's solutions (or, depending on the relative, failure to come up with solutions).

For anybody obsessed with THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO: Symptoms include desire to read about mysterious murders constantly, supernatural motive assignation, inability to stop talking about DRAGON TATTOO, and the fruitless purchase of other novels whose authors bear vaguely Scandinavian last names. Try Laura Kasischke's THE RAISING, which brings the creepiness crossed with some SECRET HISTORY-style coverup on a college campus -- but no lessons. No hugging and no learning!

For friends who are girls, or possibly girlfriends: I didn't realize how well Elaine Dundy's THE DUD AVOCADO went over as a pick at my book club until we were going over the year in pints 'n' discussions. Originally published in 1958, it's a kind of zany travelogue anchored by Sally Jay Gorse, an American wannabe actress in Paris who gets herself into a variety of scrapes and to me was reminiscent of the plucky Lucy Maud Montgomery heroines of my youth -- though not without consequences.

For fellow Top 10 list junkies: One of the problems with end-of-the-year best-of book lists is that keeping up with them can be so pricey, and if you can drop $200 on the New York Times best books of the year without blinking, I envy your resolve. So I'm happy to highlight two books making frequent appearances on these lists that also just came out in paperback, Tea Obreht's THE TIGER'S WIFE (also a National Book Award finalist) and Karen Russell's SWAMPLANDIA -- as examples of a trend I would like to see more of in the future.

For your younger cousin who is planning to major in English just like you and wants to talk about how theories are blowing his/her mind all the time: Yeah, I don't know anyone like that here... but if I did I would definitely go back in time and give that girl a copy of THE BROOM OF THE SYSTEM for that inevitable moment when Winter Break feels completely claustrophobic and the ol' thinking muscles are starting to atrophy.

Additionally two of the new books I put on my Top 10 of 2011 So Far list, THE BLOW-OFF and THE MOMENT, are available in paperback -- read and love them, please! (And BOSSYPANTS is out Jan. 3, in case you are planning to swap presents late enough to make that information useful.)

(While we're on that topic, I recently read a Salon op-ed by an author who made one of these interim lists, only to feel completely destroyed when she didn't make the top 10 of the year on Amazon. What I would like to say to this author, and I don't mean to downplay her achievement, but: No one is going to assume that your book lost greatness from now until then. No one's going to remember! And only a real jerk would point out that you were on the list "for a while" -- in part because Amazon's internal layout is so confusing that said real jerk would have to spend a long time rebutting you. So disregard that real jerk! Here's what you're going to do, you're going to put a screenshot of your achievement on your website, and then you are going to drink some champagne and it's going to be fine.)