Jennifer Marie Brissett :: Journal :: My List of the Best Books of the Decade

Why write up a list of favorite books of the decade? Well, why not? This list is sorted by year (then name) and are my favorite reads over the last 10 years. The list may seem a bit unusual, but this is my taste. It’s not for everyone. I hope whomever reads this gets something out of it. If you do, please let me know.

“The Crazed” by Ha Jin (2002)

After reading Ha Jin’s collection of stories “The Bridegroom,” I jumped at reading this novel. It was wonderful. It was also the view into the mind of graduate student trying to makes sense of life and death and his place in the world. Truly universal themes that was well crafted by a master’s hand. Ha Jin is much better known for “Waiting” but I honestly didn’t like “Waiting” as much as this novel.

“Stories of Your Life and Others” by Ted Chiang (2002)

I was introduced to Chiang’s work in the Locus Awards anthology which included “Hell is the Absence of God.” It blew me away. “Stories of Your Life” is collection from this not so prolific author. Amazing, amazing stories. I just want more. He may give a little here and a little there but it is so worth the wait to see what is coming out next from his imaginative, genius mind. ...And now Small Beer Press is reissuing this book. Squee!

“Oryx and Crake” by Margaret Atwood (2003)

Margaret Atwood and Ursula K. Le Guin have to be two of my biggest Science Fiction influences. “Oryx and Crake” is the perfect example of why I admire Atwood so much. The science and the fiction blend seamlessly together. She tells of an oh-so-plausible future that it’s eerie. I even started calling this soy based “chicken” nuggets that I get in a local area restaurant “chicken nubbins.” I still laugh at that!

“The Coyote Kings of the Space-Age Bachelor Pad” by Minister Faust (2004)

This novel was a surprise in so many ways. IMHO, Minister Faust mixed fanboy culture, urban vernacular, and literature. It’s such a fascinating book in its construction with its under-layer of a truly touching story. Faust shows that by writing in a skillful way, you can develop the trust from your reader that will give you more room to experiment. Check out this sentence: “I look up and standing over vats of preserved Chinese roots that look like the internal organs of Orcs, and near the omnipresent mound of chicken feet that looks like the carnage of an avian death camp, is a woman.”

“The Man in My Basement” by Walter Mosley (2004)

This is a bit of a departure for this mystery/science fiction author. I would like to see more of this kind of thing from him. I’m not sure how this book did when it came out. I get the sense that it flew in under the radar. It came out around the same time as “The Emperor of Ocean Park” by Stephen L. Carter which dealt with the similar topic of upper middle class blacks. The Carter book had much more fanfare attached to it. I thought that is was an overwritten book that needed a lot of editing and didn’t hold together that well. The “The Man in My Basement” was just an infinitely better book. It was suspenseful and deep. Well, worth reading.

“The Icarus Girl” by Helen Oyeyemi (2005)

I wanna hate this girl!!!! How can she be able to write like this at age 19????!!!!!!! NO FAIR!!!!!! This novel is inventive, smart, deep, scary and just a pleasure to read. Again I say, NO FAIR!!!!!

“100 Bullets” (Graphic Novels) by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso (2000-2009)

This is some of the nastiest, grimiest, dirtiest stuff I’ve ever read. It’s like the shows Homicide mixed with the Sopranos on crack. No child should ever read this stuff! Yet it is some of the best reading I did all decade. The stories, the mysteries, and the characters all lift off the page. I recommend this only for the strong of stomach. If you can take it, it’s really worth the read.

“All That Is Gone” by Pramoedya Ananta Toer (2005)

I wrote a small book review of this back when I read the book in which I said—

“‘All That is Gone’ is a wonderful collection of short stories written with such a clear, simple elegance, that you can almost hear the morning rain dripping from the bamboo eaves. In these stories of Indonesia, we see the confusion in the struggle to reclaim independence from the Dutch, and then the Communists, and then the Republicans, and then the Dutch again. We bear witness to the struggle of a people to survive against wave after wave of forces beyond their control who try to colonize their minds as well as their country. You find yourself in awe of the hope, the fear, and the courage of a people who attempt to maintain the sanity of an ordinary existence in the midst of political turmoil.”

“Feeling Very Strange” ed. James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel (2006)

Full disclosure: James Patrick Kelly has been my writing mentor, but I read this book long before I met him. (BTW, he’s a really great guy.—Hi Jim!) I picked up this book because I just wanted to understand what this “Slipstream” thingy was. It is still a difficult concept to pin down. I think this collection goes a long way in explaining it, though. It also includes some really incredible stories. I liked the way the editors constructed this book by including the actual discussions authors were having on this topic as they were creating the genre. Fascinating stuff. I wrote a craft annotation for this book for my MFA where I said that “The thing about writing in this cognitive dissident way, it echoes reality very well. Things don’t happens in as straightforward a way as many stories make them out to be. Life is full of contradictions and anomalies that when written on paper seem unreal. Maybe slipstream stretches the boundary of reality just enough that we can accept the absurdities of the situations as a vision of what could actually be.”

“The Drowned Life” by Jeffrey Ford (2008)

I first heard Jeffrey Ford read at the KGB Bar in NYC. I had never heard of him before. So when I saw his name pop up here and there on the Internet I started reading some of his short stories. Then I picked up “The Drowned Life.” Wow! This is an author that knows what he is doing!! I basically have been studying his short stories since reading this book. He is a master of the form. (Shh, I even started a fansite for his work at www.thedrownedlife.com)

Also these short story collections --

• “The Dew Breaker” by Edwidge Danticat (2004)

• “Returning My Sister’s Face” by Eugie Foster (2009)