Best books I read in 2006?
In fiction, it would have to be most of the second half of the Aubrey-Maturin series by Patrick O’Brian. I read six in 2006 and the last two in early January 2007, and it’s a terrific body of work. Its acclaim and success need little boost from this blog, but I enjoyed and learned from the whole run. The only competition I’ve read in historical fiction is Dorothy Dunnett, with the Lymond and Niccolo series, plus her take on Macbeth.
Beyond the captain and his doctor, best from last year’s reading: Snow, by Orhan Pamuk, the best of his novels and a look at many sides of Islam, modernity and Europe; The Death of Achilles, by Boris Akunin, a witty and subversive detective series set in late Tsarist Russia, far fewer of which have been translated into English than into German, annoyingly enough; An Equal Music, by Vikram Seth, with its insight into the minds of musicians and a virtuoso book by an absurdly talented writer; and Accelerando, by Charles Stross, head-stretching science fiction for the early 21st century.
Over in non-fiction, I would start the list with: At Canaan’s Edge, by Taylor Branch, concludes his epic and riveting account of America in the era of Martin Luther King. Gripping writing, definitive research, passionate commitment, simply a great book. The other favorites from non-fiction also tend toward the long and the historical: The Fatal Shore, by Robert Hughes, a mold-breaking history of Australia’s colonial period; The Prize, by Daniel Yergin, the history of the 20th century with oil as its central theme; A Writer at War, by Vasily Grossman, annotated stories from a Soviet journalist at the front lines of the Great Patriotic War; The Mission, by Dana Priest, on the militarization of American foreign policy; and The Places in Between, by Rory Stewart, a British ex-diplomat’s walk through central Afghanistan in the winter after the Taliban fell.
Complete list (in order read) is below the fold. Links are to previous writing about the book or author on AFOE.
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, the closest thing that modern Azerbaijan has to a national novel, was first published in German in 1937, sold in various translations, hit US bestseller lists in the early 1970s and bears the name Kurban Said as its author.