Bibliography, 2021

Tantalisingly close to the pre-baby benchmark of ten books a month, in the end I fell short by five. If I'm honest, I would have been a hollow victory, bulked up with a lot of science fiction and fantasy (28 books, more than any year since 2002). Much of that was excellent, and I am very glad I did a strong run through of golden age Sci-Fi too. It is, however, a) easier to read and b) doing nothing for my aim to hold down my white men percentage in fiction. 

Fiction in general was high. I actually read a little less non-fiction than last year, and it should also be noted that I read nine books by or about the Mitfords, which is probably too many. For the first time in a while, BOTMs were roughly in line with reading rates. Fiction about half my BOTMs (four of which were science fiction). History and cultural books three each.

Choosing a favourite novel was only slightly difficult. I do love Foundation and Dune, and Shipstead I thought was robbed of the Booker, but this was a straight choice between Achebe and a loving Martian pastiche of the Chalet School. I loved the latter, but Anthills of the Savannah was outstanding. I wish people talked about this more than Things fall apart.

Again this year, non-fiction was overwhelmingly harder. Three outstanding books in Didion, Trevor Roper and Alexievich. They are all massively famous which makes it embarrassing that I'd read none of them before. Of all of them Alexievich is the one that everyone should read. It's immediacy and remorseless illumination of a completely invisible part of World War Two is essential reading. But, for me, and for any historian I suspect, Trevor Roper's analysis of the end of that war is just an exemplary piece of writing and the historical method. I don't think schoolchildren should study the War, but if they are going to, I find it baffling that they aren't forced to read this.

Jan: The Mitford sisters (ed. C. Mosley), Letters between six sisters (2007)
Feb: C. Achebe, Anthills of the Savannah (1987)
Mar: H.R. Trevor Roper, The last days of Hitler (1947)
Apr: R. Heinlein, Double Star (1956)
May: S. Sturluson, The prose edda
Jun: S. Alexievich, The unwomanly face of war (1985)
Jul: L. Sprague de Camp, Literary swordsmen and sorcerers (1976)
Aug: J. Didion, The year of magical thinking (2005)
Sep: I. Asimov, Foundation (1951)*
Oct: M. Shipstead, Great circle (2021)*
Nov: F. Herbert, Dune (1965)*
Dec: C. Brenchley, Three twins at the Crater School (2021)

Bibliography, December 2021

BOTM: C. Brenchley, Three twins at the Crater school (2021)

D. Adams and M. Cawardine (1990)

E. Carrere, The kingdom (2014)
D. Devonshire, Wait for me (2010)
K. Addison, Witness for the dead (2021)
C. Mieville, Perdido Street station (2000)

M. Rubin, The hollow crown, 1307-1485 (2005)

E. Taylor, Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont (1968)

C. Thubron, Emperor (1978)

I. Vincent, Dinner with Edward (2016)

Three great books here. Taylor is one of those largely forgotten novelists that deserve not to be, and this was excellent. Better though was Dinner with Edward. I read it in a single sitting and it was exactly what you would want this memoir to be. The right balance of introspection and external engagement, and in this case combined with a lovely bit of food porn. I am already committed to the apricot souffle. Looking online, I am not the only one.

However, and with full credit to Anna, my favourite book is intensely personal. I had never imagined that anyone other than me would write a loving pastiche of the Chalet School set on Mars under a steampunk future British Empire. But they have, and it is amazing. Tonally, it's near (though not absolutely) perfect, the world-building is unobtrusive, and the plot contains the right mix of excitement within a fundamentally secure environment. There's another one. I hope there are many more.  

Couple of final thoughts on The Kingdom. Lots of chat about how good this is in religious circles, but I found it very difficult to read. I felt, like I did with Tey's The Daughter of time (and in fact Thubron's on this list), that it was fatally flawed as a book because it couldn't decide what it wanted to be. Firstly, the autobiographical section, and especially the intrusions into the main text, were unnecessary (the section on the author's pornography watching habits was a particular low point). Then it falls between two stools: is it a novelistic treatment of Luke and Paul or is it a serious analytical work? I wish it had been the former, but it kept trying to be the latter, and you just can't do that without footnotes. Frustrating, though some sections were very good indeed.