Top 10 Tuesdays is hosted by The Broke & The Bookish, head over there to participate.
1-Haruki Murakami: To this day, he's still considered like an exotic fantasy. Japanese people are fighting over the copies of his novels, while we're sleeping on the job. He is one of the best writers I had the chance to read in my life, and he should be recognized as such. All his novels are great, but Norwegian Wood and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle are flying even higher.
2-Allan Guthrie: Quite frankly, I don't get why people don't fight over copies of his books yet. He's a brutal noir writer, yet his creativity allows him to get away with the most complex plots. And you know, what happens when brutal characters have to deal with complex problems right? *insert evil smiley here*
3-Colin Bateman: I would qualify his work of magical realism, if it wasn't so deep in crime fiction territory. I Predict A Riot is exactly what it promises, an uplifting display of violence and destruction. He's getting decent success in Europe (so I heard), but I have no idea why North American people don't even know his name.
4-Réjean Ducharme: A literary myth that never really pierced through the language barrier. He's barely even know in his hometown. He is difficult, but his work reads like a fountain of fury, a celebration of life and yet, his tone is dark and gloomy. Ducharme is the most successful secretive writer I know, so maybe he doesn't want recognition.
5-Alessandro Baricco: A dumb, egghead director butcher the adaptation of one of his novel and that was it. No more momentum for Baricco. Too bad, because he has the most unique, light-hearted style. His stories are tales, his characters are heroes without noble quests, characters of their times, with modern preoccupation. Read Silk, Ocean Sea and please, don't watch that awful, awful film.
6-Joan Didion: I see women read Atwood, Austen, Woolf, Smith, Hurston and the Brontë sisters, but I have never seen one read Didion. And it's a travesty, she has one of the strongest, most graceful style. Her essays cast a light on the myths of the Californian dreamscape. A sad and melancholic light that is.
7-Edogawa Rampo: A mysterious pulp writer from Japan, with slightly demented horror/crime stories. He is a forgotten glory of the land of the rising sun, his style is unique and barbaric. Supposedly, his name is an alliteration of "Edgar Allan Poe". His fiction sure reads like a more modern twist on the master.
8-Sean Ferrell: Ferrell is a debut author, so you might have not heard of him yet. But it's still time for you to hit the bandwagon before it trails off. Numb was greatly emotional, despite the book being about lack of feeling. It's a very Palahniuk-esque ride.
9-Henry Rollins: I'm kind of cheating here. Rollins is a celebrity, but his writing is way underrated. Most people doesn't even know he wrote books. That's due to the small size of his publishing house and quiet promotion around them, but they are really good. It's somewhat of a work-in-progress memoir, made out of journal entries and strange micro fiction bits. Think Thoreau on adrenaline.
10-Heath Lowrance: Another debut writer that you need to get your hands on. The Bastard Hand is a violent shakedown. Lowrance has a gift for a conceptual approach to noir. It's clearly not for everyone, but it's impossible to leave out. He has the crushing power of a steamroller, yet finds a way to have perspective on his characters.
16 comments:
I have to say when I saw this top 10 topic I was kind of excited to see who you would come up with and now I have a new collection of authors to check out, Murakami, Didion and Rampo especially.
Well, I am flattered :)
Thanks for including international authors. We really need to read more of those.
Great list! I couldn’t agree more with your #1 and #5 (read Silk, havne’t seen the film; will add Ocean Sea to my TBR). All the others look amazing and I can’t wait to read some of the books you mentioned by them.
I have a few Murakami's on my shelves to read. I read and loved The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle but I definitely need lots of time and a not worn out brain to get through them. Maybe I should try more of his short stories.
I will check out some of your other suggestions.
Woot! Joan Didion for the win! Slouching Toward Bethlehem is one of my favorite books of essays ever!
I've got a Didion on my nightstand at home. I'll bump it up to the top of the pile. Nice list, Ben. Most are new names to me.
I'll share in the love for Murakami and Didion! I'm pretty excited for IQ84 to come out this year. Haven't heard of the other authors, so thanks for giving me new things to read.
Impressive list! I'm excited about this hop because there are so many authors that I didn't know existed, not that my world is so broad, but it's growing :-)
I'm with you on Didion and Murakami and I got some great recommendations from your list, so thanks.
Check out my post here: http://hawthornescarlet.blogspot.com/2011/03/top-ten-tuesday-check-um-out.html
I think Murakami is a hugely well known and well read author, not just in Japan. In fact he's more popular outside of Japan, certainly critically, and is seen as a very westernised writer. Norweigan wood, his biggest hit, is very atypical of the rest of his writing. I don't know how well he's known in the US though.
Colin Bateman is a very successful mainstream Northen Irish writer who's had a couple of his books turned into (terrible) movies. I think he isn't that well known in America because the genre (crime with quirky characters) is pretty well served already.
Is Michel Houellebecq known over there? he wrote Atomised which was a big hit.
Murakami is getting there, but he's still viewed as "that special writer from Japan". He should be up there with Franzen on Oprah's couch. I'm that big on him.
Bateman is a relative unknown here. I Predict A Riot was...well a riot! It's too bad, he doesn't get more love. Even his Twitter follower count suck.
And yeah, I know Houellebecq. Read him in original language. Atomised is "Les Particules Élémentaire" which would translate to "Elementary Particles". If you liked this, try "Platforms" it's bonkers.
I've read everything of Houellebecq's that's been translated into English, including Platform, Possibility of an Island and even Lanzarote. Whatever is my favourite, a perverse version of Camus' The Stranger. He is a horrendous character by alll accounts, but a great writer and very prescient, and very funny in a nasty way. Not everyone agrees.
I think Houellebecq has that very French disease of writers who can't invent an ending that makes any fucking sense. Great settings, great characters, but no matter what they do, it will inevitably fall flat.
I'm one of those people who knows who Henry Rollins is, but I never knew he wrote anything! I'm slightly appalled with myself and must go look into this.
Murakami has been on my list for quite some time, but as per usual, there's so many books to read that they all get in the way. I've been told to read Hard Boiled Wonderland and The End of The World, and Kafka on The Shore.
Great list Ben, thanks for sharing.
Shardour, personally I thought Hard Boiled Wonderland and Kafka On The Shore were two of his weakest offerings. Kafka is superbly written, but that's about it. The Wind-up Bird Chronicles and Norwegian Wood are two of my favorite novels of all-time.
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