As is only fitting, our final “Best Books of 2009″ list–again featuring a grab bag of titles and genres–comes from our intrepid editor, Cindy Orr. 2009 was a great year in books, a fact to which we paid homage by posting 2009 lists a week into 2010. Here’s hoping for even bigger and better book things in 2010!
Genre/Subgenre: Speculative Fiction/Science Fiction/Bleak Future
Margaret Atwood–The Year of the Flood
Genre/Subgenre: Mainstream Fiction/Character-Driven
Kathryn Stockett–The Help
Genre/Subgenre: Thrillers/Maniacs, Murderers, Psychopaths, and Serial Killers
Michael Connelly–The Scarecrow
Genre/Subgenre: Crime/Suspense
Laura Lippman–Life Sentences
Genre/Subgenre: Crime/Mystery & Detective Stories/Amateur Detectives
Stieg Larsson–The Girl Who Played with Fire
Cindy Orr is the editor of the Reader’s Advisor Online blog. She is the former Collection Manager at Cleveland Public Library and has also been Fiction Selector and Director of Technical Services at Cuyahoga County Public Library. She consults with libraries and book industry companies, speaks frequently at library conferences, and teaches Readers’ Advisory Services for Kent State University’s Graduate School of Library and Information Science.
That’s really intriguing, Sarah! I think I’m one of those readers who kind of sees and hears the characters in my mind and the story just pulled me right in. Now I’ll have to go back and look at it again. At first I thought it was a little strange to use dialect only for the African American characters, but then I realized that the book was written from Skeeter’s point of view, and she wouldn’t have thought that she herself or the other white characters had an accent–except for the one “white trash” exception. To me, it hit all the right notes…even the sad and obvious fact that after Skeeter stirred up a lot of trouble and was able to think of herself as doing a good thing, she was able to leave it all behind and escape to New York and a better life at the end…unlike all the maids who had bravely told their stories and had to stay and live with the consequences. But then again, she was only twenty-three. I wonder how it would work in audio?
Now, I probably shouldn’t say anything, but I can’t help myself, because Kathryn Stockett’s book “The Help” featured so prominently on many readers’ “best books” lists. But I tried to start it and couldn’t finish it–did the use of dialect in it bother anyone else? Anyone else not care for this book, or am I the only one in the nation?