BOOKS 2017
January
After reading "Amnesia" at the end of 2016, I delved into a few other novels set in the streets around my home suburb and the central business district of Melbourne. I couldn't quite relate to "On Brunswick Ground" though it is most directly set in the place and I live: the author, a French migrant to Australia, ran the Red Wheelbarrow bookshop on Lygon Street. I assume the bar which the main character hangs out in is the Alderman, which was across the road at the time. The novel is also set around the time of the real-life rape and murder of an Irishwoman which happened a short distance from my home in 2012 and was understandably a big factor in how I thought about the safety of where I live. There is a certain gauzy vagueness around some French film and literature in translation (which admittedly might come from stereotypes, but I note we have borrowed the words 'gauze' and 'vague' from French) and that was evident in this novel as well, even though I understand it is the first of her books to have been written in English. "A Wrong Turn at the Office of Unmade Lists" is a very odd novel set about thirty years in the future in a Melbourne that seems a bit like Phnom Penh. It includes the unexplained neologism 'LitLat' which we can assume refers to Little LaTrobe Street - I like these minute bursts of local colour.
Moving on to a novel which has nothing to do with Melbourne: "Yuki chan in Bronte Country" was a new book by Mick Jackson, who has written several of my favourite books. In fact there is a funny coincidence to be related about me and this book. Back in the 1990s, a family friend of my parents worked as head buyer for a very large bookshop in Sydney. When she visited our home in the countryside, she would often bring new books which she thought would interest me. Over a period of several years, she brought me Mick Jackson's first two novels, "The Underground Man" (which I loved as a teenager) and "Five Boys" (which I read at university, and which has an ending so audacious that I thought there must have been something wrong with my copy - surely several chapters had been missed out?). Anyway, I thought these two books were amazing but went off to live my life in different parts of the world, not really thinking about Mick Jackson at all. About a decade later, my wife came home one day and asked me if I'd heard of the writer Mick Jackson. I said yes I had, and I really liked his books. It turned out that he lived in the same town as us, and was looking to talk to Japanese women living in the UK as research for a new novel. I think my wife met up with Mick a number of times, and introduced him to a friend or two of hers, and then a further five years later this book was published - in which the main character, Yuki chan, shares with my wife some definite identifiable traits and a family history (though somewhat mutated from reality). I never met Mick but the way he accidentally wrote his way into my own family history still seems to me to be a fairly remarkable outcome given I used to sit in my bedroom in country New South Wales reading his paperbacks.
B01. On Brunswick Ground, Catherine de Saint Phalle.
B02. How to Sharpen Pencils: A Practical and Theoretical Treatise on the Artisanal Craft of Pencil Sharpening, for writers, artists, contractors, flange turners, anglesmiths, and civil servants, with illustrations showing current practice, David Rees.
B03. A Wrong Turn at the Office of Unmade Lists, Jane Rawson.
B04. Botchan, Natsume Soseki (tr. J. Cohn).
B05. Yuki chan in Bronte Country, Mick Jackson.
B06. Salad Days, Ronnie Scott.
B07. The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic, Jessica Hooper.
B07a. Asterix and the Black Gold, Albert Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B08. Regions of Thick-Ribbed Ice, Helen Garner.
B08a. Asterix and Son, Albert Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B09. Portrait of a Man, Georges Perec (tr. David Bellos).
B09a. Sandman’s Advice to the Unpopular, The Sandman.
February
I tend not to read much American fiction, simply because I find English and Australian fiction much closer to my internal life, and while it can be fun to make the leap to reading Americans (it's a leap because American authors will on occasion provide minimal context or explanation for things/products/feelings which don't exist outside their borders [depending on social background, perhaps they've never had to contextualise themselves], which is interesting in its own way, but means I know I am reading something filled with unbridgeable gaps) - however "Moonglow" came to me strongly recommended by a colleague. I powered through it, and though it was replete with the sorts of distancing minutiae I mention above, it was really enjoyable.
B10. Moonglow, Michael Chabon.
B11. Glad to wear Glasses, John Hegley.
B11a. Asterix Versus Caesar, “Goscinny/Uderzo” (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B12. Living Simple, Free & Happy: How to Simplify, Declutter Your Home, and Reduce Stress, Debt and Waste, Cristin Frank.
B13. Reckoning: a memoir, Magda Szubanski.
B14. Why does my cat do that? Answers to 50 questions cat lovers ask, Catherine Davidson.
B15. The Most Dangerous Book: the Battle for James Joyce’s Ulysses, Kevin Birmingham.
March
B16. Hack Attack: How the truth caught up with Rupert Murdoch, Nick Davies.
B17. Household Management for Men: The Groundbreaking guide to Domestic Duties, Nigel Browning.
B18. The Media and Me, Stuart Littlemore.
B18a. Asterix and the Magic Carpet, Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B19. Island 130, Spring 2012, ed. Dale Campisi.
B20. Hyperbole and a Half: unfortunate situations, flawed coping mechanisms, mayhem, and other things that happened, Allie Brosh.
B20a. Ethel & Ernest, Raymond Briggs.
B21. Operation Getafix, “Goscinny/Uderzo” (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B22. The Silver Castle, Clive James.
B23. Satin Island, Tom McCarthy.
April
John Cowper Powys, like Jane Rawson in January and again in May, was a recommendation from the Twitter feed of Dave Graney (of which, more below). "The Brazen Head" is clearly the work of a madman but perhaps one like Alan Moore, engaged in the creation of a defined madness with measurable boundaries. It was a slog, but I think I came out of it with an increased respect for the merits of eccentricity.
Moving into the realm of Asterix comics published when I was a teenager and consequently not reading them at the time. Asterix and the Secret Weapon feels very 90s, both in its "women's issues" theme, and its not-very-good-at-dealing-with-it-ness. Asterix himself, always the peacemaker and bastion of clear thinking, is actually a horrible sexist in this comic, which is very off-putting.
B24. The Brazen Head, John Cowper Powys.
B25. Asterix and the Secret Weapon, Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
May/June
B26. Tait’s Modern Guide to Record Collecting, John Tait.
B27. The Passion of Bradley Manning: The Story Behind the Wikileaks Whistleblower, Chase Madar.
B28. Peter Cook: So Farewell Then - The Untold Life of Peter Cook, Wendy E. Cook.
B28a. How Obelix Fell into the Magic Potion when He was a Little Boy, Goscinny/Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B29. Watching the English, Kate Fox.
B30. From the Wreck, Jane Rawson.
B31. Sh*t Asian Mothers Say, Benjamin Law & Michelle Law.
B31a. Stark, Ben Elton.
B32. You Could Do Something Amazing with Your Life [You are Raoul Moat], Andrew Hankinson.
B33. The Spy Who Couldn’t Spell: a dyslexic traitor, an unbreakable code, and the FBI’s hunt for America’s stolen secrets, Yudhijit Bhattacharjee.
B34. Ireland Versus Israel, Raymond Watson, Bill Drummond et al.
B35. State of the Art: Film Writings 1983-1985, Pauline Kael.
B36. Asterix Conquers America: The Book of the Film, Goscinny/Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B37. Fame in the 20th Century, Clive James.
B38. Indiana Jones and the Pyramid of the Sorcerer, Ryder Windham.
B39. The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst.
B40. Asterix and Obelix All at Sea, Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
July
B41. Asterix and the Actress, Albert Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B42. Corfu: a novel, Robert Dessaix.
B43. An Unsuitable Attachment, Barbara Pym.
B44. Content Provider: Selected Short Prose Pieces, 2011~2016, Stewart Lee.
B45. Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs, Johann Hari.
B46. The Worst of LCD: The Missing Art and Writing of WFMU 91.1fm, ed. Dave the Spazz.
B47. Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures, Mark Fisher.
B48. McSweeney’s 18, ed. Eli Horowitz.
B49. Cartoons of Australian History, Peter Coleman and Les Tanner.
B50. The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism, Naoki Higashida (tr. KA Yoshida & D Mitchell).
B50a. The One Day of the Year, Alan Seymour.
August
B51. Norm and Ahmed, Rooted, The Roy Murphy Show: three plays by Alexander Buzo.
B52. Asterix and the Class Act, Goscinny/Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B52a. Ragworts, Bill Drummond.
B53. Asperger’s Syndrome: A Guide for Parents and Professionals, Tony Attwood.
B54. Top of the Box: The Complete Guide to BBC Records and Tapes Singles, Tim Worthington.
B55. Asterix Annual, “Dargaud Editeur 1979 D’Apres Goscinny et Uderzo”.
B56. Remotely Interesting: A TV Quiz Book for People with Eyes, Ben Baker.
B57. The Guest Cat, Takashi Hiraide (tr. Eric Selland).
B58. Dawn of Fear, Susan Cooper.
September
B59. The Blaze of Obscurity, Clive James.
B60. Asterix and the Falling Sky, Albert Uderzo (tr. Bell/Hockridge).
B61. Yeah Yeah Yeah: The Story of Modern Pop, Bob Stanley.
B62. Fawlty Towers: Fully Booked, Morris Bright and Robert Ross.
B63. Translation, Humour and Literature, Volume One, ed. Delia Chiaro.
B64. Road Series, Hugo Race.
B65. Man Shines Shoes, Bill Drummond (w. tr. Verena Nala).
B66. Man Makes Bed, Bill Drummond (w. tr. Zhang Rui & Hou Junmou).
B67. Cat and Mouse, Günter Grass (tr. Ralph Manheim).
B68. Ampersand Magazine Issue 6: One Little Room (Winter 2013), ed. Alice Gage.
October
I went to the launch party of Dave Graney's second autobiography, Workshy, kind of in the role of a fan who tried to not to get in anyone's way. He kindly signed my copy and I left him to get on with it. There were a few other names of note there like Tony Martin, Celia Pacquola and Sarina Rowell, people who I generally admire the hell out of, but the event had the sort of fun, low-key vibe that I thought could be ruined by any fannish interaction. This was proven when I mentioned to Sarina Rowell that I really admired her writing, and she - a bit surprised - said Where have you seen it? In a demonstration of utter awkwardness I started clutching at the air in what was probably not at all a clear pantomime of me reading her e-book on my phone.
B69. Man of Letters: Dog Rock 3, David Foster.
B70. The 25 Paintings, Bill Drummond.
B71. Quarterly Essay Issue 30 - Last Drinks: The Impact of the Northern Territory Intervention, Paul Toohey.
B72. Quarterly Essay Issue 32 - American Revolution: The Fall of Wall Street and the Rise of Barack Obama, Kate Jennings.
B73. Asterix and Obelix’s Birthday - The Golden Book, Goscinny/Uderzo (tr. Anthea Bell).
B73a. Sean’s Book, Sean Hughes.
B74. Robert Lowell: Poems Selected by Michael Hoffman, Robert Lowell.
B75. Quarterly Essay Issue 40 - Trivial Pursuit: Leadership and the End of the Reform Era, George Magalogenis.
B76. Spirit Rising: My Life, My Music, Angélique Kidjo with Rachel Wenrick.
B77. Workshy: My Life as a Bludge, Dave Graney.
B78. El Dorado, Dorothy Porter.
B79. Slipstream, Roger McDonald.
November
B80. Wallpaper* City Guide: Bangkok, ed. Richard Cook.
B81. 2023, The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu,
B82. Hey! Nietzsche! Leave Them Kids Alone!: The Romantic Movement, rock & roll, and the end of civilisation as we know it, Craig Shuftan.
B83. She's Having a Laugh: 25 of Australia's funniest women on life, love and comedy, Various contributors, no editor listed, Affirm Press.
B84. Dancing in the Distraction Factory: Music Television and Popular Culture, Andrew Goodwin,
B85. Last Days of Summer, Vicki Thornton.
B86. Asterix and the Picts, Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad, tr. Anthea Bell.
B87. Four Australian Plays, Bozu, Hibberd, Romeril.
B88. eyE Marty: The Newly Discovered Autobiography of a Comic Genius, Marty Feldman.
B89. Starlite Terrace, Patrick Roth (tr. Krishna Winston).
December
B90. The Discovery of Dragons, Graeme Base.
B91. Grant & I: Inside and Outside the Go-Betweens, Robert Forster.
B92. Thoughts of a Late-Night Knitter, Pam Ayres.
B93. The Complete Paintings: Bosch, Walter Bosing. (Spine: Hieronymus Bosch. Title page: Hieronymus Bosch, c. 1450-1516: Between Heaven and Hell)
B94. Porterhouse Major, Margaret J. Baker.
B95. Casino Royale, Ian Fleming.
B96. Asterix and the Missing Scroll, Ferri/Conrad, tr. Anthea Bell.
B97. The Sex Lives of Australians: A History, Frank Bongiorno.
B98. The Believer: Ninety-Eighth Issue: Fleece Tunnel: May 2013, eds. H Julavits, A Leland, V Vida.
B99. Fairyland, Sumner Locke Elliott.
B100. Dr. Fegg's Encyclopaedia of ALL World Knowledge (formerly The Nasty Book), Terry Jones & Michael Palin.
B100a. A Local Book for Local People, The League of Gentlemen.
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