Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of 1999

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Poll Results

OptionVotes
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson 5
Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem 4
War And War by László Krasznahorkai 3
Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee 3
Ghostwritten by David Mitchell 3
The Intuitonist by Colson Whitehead 2
Q by Luther Blissett 2
Spitnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami 1
Waiting by Ha Jin 1
All Tomorrow's Parties by William Gibson 1
Juneteenth by Ralph Ellison 1
Amulet by Roberto Bolano 1
Generation "П" by Victor Pelevin 1
My Century by Gunter Grass 1
In America by Susan Sontag 1
A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle 0
The Blackwater Lightship by Colm Tóibín 0
Somersault by Kenzaburō Ōe 0
The Visit Of The Royal Physician by Per Olov Enquist 0
Hardboiled & Hard Luck by Banana Yoshimoto 0
The Discoverer by Jan Kjærstad 0
The Last Ringbearer by Kirill Eskov 0
Fear And Trembling by Amelie Nothomb 0
Tarzan's Tonsillitis by Alfredo Bryce 0
The Gaze by Elif Shafak 0
The Coldest Winter Ever by Sista Souljah 0
The Knight Of All Times by Miho Mosulishvili 0
L by Erlend Loe 0
Blueprint by Charlotte Kerner 0
Villa Aurore by J. M. G. Le Clézio 0
Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk 0
Hannibal by Thomas Harris 0
Fasting, Feasting by Anita Desai 0
Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear 0
Cracks by Sheila Kohler 0
The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket 0
The Translator by Leila Aboulela 0
Prisoner In A Red Rose Chain by Jeffrey Moore 0
The Sea Came In At Midnight by Steve Erickson 0
Wither by J.G. Passerella 0
Affinity by Sarah Waters 0
Incest by Christine Angot 0
I'm Off by Jean Echenoz 0
Red Forest by Mo Yan 0
One Man's Bible by Gao Xingjian 0
A Place Of Execution by Val McDermid 0
The Ground Beneath Her Feet by Salman Rushdie 0
Girl With A Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier 0
Boxy An Star by Daren King 0
Our Fathers by Andrew O' Hagan 0


Daniel_Rf, Friday, 8 October 2021 11:35 (three years ago)

I've had computer problems and been missing these threads, but it turns out the '90s really is a barren wasteland for me and my reading. Not even read anything crap this year. I've had the Luther Blissett on my radar for, fuck, approaching decades now, but haven't ever seen it around to pick up.

emil.y, Friday, 8 October 2021 13:24 (three years ago)

Disgrace is Coetzee's best.

I've started that Sontag novel three times.

So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 8 October 2021 13:31 (three years ago)

i've only read invisible monsters, i'm not voting for it

STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Friday, 8 October 2021 13:32 (three years ago)

Oh, Motherless Brooklyn , that's a good one.

So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 8 October 2021 13:41 (three years ago)

I think I started to tune out contemporary literary fiction at this time. I'm sure I read Motherless Brooklyn because all my friends were doing so, but I have no memory of it.

Extinct Namibian shrub genus: Var. (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 8 October 2021 13:57 (three years ago)

Only read Amulet (which is great) and Disgrace. I actually like some of Coetzee's earlier novels more. I'll be voting for 2666 so I think I'll refrain from voting here.

Echo Emily. 90s are a gap but I'm unsure as to what I need to catch-up on.

xyzzzz__, Friday, 8 October 2021 14:01 (three years ago)

The Pelevin novel is also titled Homo Zapiens, it’s a blast and I’m probably voting for it though I really liked Ghostwritten as well.

JoeStork, Friday, 8 October 2021 14:55 (three years ago)

The Intuitionist is wonderful. But then again, I remember REALLY liking Waiting, but can't remember anything about it now. Huh, I think just based on my remembered feeling, it's probably Waiting.

Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 8 October 2021 15:25 (three years ago)

Yeah, Waiting. Starting in the Cultural Revolution, a doctor and a nurse fall in love and want to marry, but he's already got a wife back in the village, and to divorce would go against tradition and stability of the People's Republic or something like that. But she keeps trying to get him to do it, and eventually he gives it a shot, with wild results, and there are other incidents and sort of a low-hanging electric fence of tensions and inertia all along the way, as they settle into discontent and become a negative barometer of social changes,but their lives do change too, and it's---tragicomic, except that's a fancy word for the effect---but I can imagine Kafka digging it, in between letters to Felice.

dow, Friday, 8 October 2021 16:32 (three years ago)

i recall thinking the very end (and build to the end i guess) of cryptonomicon was v cinematic & resultantly obv could/should be adapted to screen. wonder if its ever come close or whats the deal

voted intuitionist

johnny crunch, Friday, 8 October 2021 16:36 (three years ago)

Disgrace is absolutely Coetzee's best. The Intuitionist was quite the calling card.

Heavy Messages (jed_), Friday, 8 October 2021 17:25 (three years ago)

Tarzan's Tonsillitis??

alimosina, Friday, 8 October 2021 19:16 (three years ago)

Another year in which I barely read anything

Legalize Suburban Benches (Raymond Cummings), Saturday, 9 October 2021 00:18 (three years ago)

Juneteenth it is by default. I have the Gibson book and made it a few pages in but haven’t been in the right state of mind to dig in deep.

Legalize Suburban Benches (Raymond Cummings), Saturday, 9 October 2021 00:21 (three years ago)

cryptonomicon narrowly over ghostwritten. those are the only 2 i've read. both page after page non-stop bangers

flopson, Saturday, 9 October 2021 00:25 (three years ago)

The Knight Of All Times by Miho Mosulishvili

Unfortunately I don't read Georgian and it hasn't been translated.

alimosina, Saturday, 9 October 2021 01:06 (three years ago)

the fact that All Tomorrow's Parties is here makes me wonder where Virtual Light and Idoru were 8)

idoru is probably my favourite of the three so this gets surrogate votes

koogs, Saturday, 9 October 2021 11:03 (three years ago)

(Ghostwritten and Cryptonomicon being the other two i've read. the caves thing makes this hard for me to read)

koogs, Saturday, 9 October 2021 11:07 (three years ago)

Disgrace is magnificent. So that.

Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Saturday, 9 October 2021 12:29 (three years ago)

god there's some wrong 'uns on this list

anyway, Q by a country mile

look on my guacs, ye mighty, and dis pear (Noodle Vague), Saturday, 9 October 2021 12:42 (three years ago)

Tarzan's Tonsillitis??

Sadly disappointing:

Tarzan's Tonsillitis (original title: La amigdalitis de Tarzán, 1999) is an epistolary novel from the Peruvian writer Alfredo Bryce.

Plot summary
It is about the romance between Fernanda and Juan Manuel del Carpio. It tells how life can pass and they keep in touch through the years only by mail. They meet sometimes in different cities of America and Europe but they never stay together for long. So they keep writing each other.

Daniel_Rf, Saturday, 9 October 2021 12:59 (three years ago)

To the best of my memory as I read all these some time ago: Disgrace is one of those books about people where I can't figure out what makes them tick or why I would want to read about them; Cryptonomicon is probably the second best of the four Stephenson's I've read though I'm not sure I was completely sold on it; Q is an intellectual historical thriller in the Eco mould except with more cynicism, violence, and far left politics, so I'm voting for that. (Though I thought the follow up Altai was far less entertaining.)

ledge, Saturday, 9 October 2021 19:26 (three years ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

System, Monday, 11 October 2021 00:01 (three years ago)

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

System, Tuesday, 12 October 2021 00:01 (three years ago)

Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of 2000

Daniel_Rf, Tuesday, 12 October 2021 11:19 (three years ago)


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