Everything I Read in 2022

 

Hello all, 

I hope you're all off to do something exciting this New Year's Eve. I, as usual, will be staying in like the grumpy old git that I am. However, I thought I'd post the full list of everything I read in 2022, which includes some articles and short stories as well as actual books. You can find my choice of 'Best of' in this blog...this one...here

Explodobok: The World of 80s Actions Movies According to Smershpod by John Rain

One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each: A Treasury of Classical Japanese Verse, collected by Fujiwara no Teika (trans Peter Macmillan)

Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata

After Dark by Haruki Murakami

The Stromboul Train byGraham Greene

Tokyo Ueno Station by Miri Yū

As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams by Lady Sarashima

In Praise of Shadows by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki

Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata

Hōjōki by Kamo no Chōmei

Essays in Idleness by Yoshida Kenkō

The Penguin Book of Japanese Verse - Geoffrey Bownas/Anthony Thwaite [Eds/Trans]

The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Bashō

Beauty and Sadness by Yasunari Kawabata

The Diary of Lady Murasaki by Lady Murasaki

All The Poems Contained Within Will Mean Everything to Everyone by Joe Dunthorne

Between The Lights by E F Benson

Financing Finnegan by F Scott Fitzgerald

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilmam

Killing Floor by Lee Child

Tomorrow by Joseph Conrad

I Murdered My Library by Linda Grant

Pictures Don't Lie by Katherine MacClean

The Lady Astronaut of Mars by Mary Robinette Kowal

A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P Djèlí Clark

On Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau

Preface to Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

Preface to the Lyrical Ballads by William Wordsworth

What is History, Now?  by Helen Carr/Suzannah Lipscomb

Confessions of a Mask by Yukio Mishima

Combat Gnosticism: The Ideology of First World War Poetry Criticism by James Campbell

Arias and Raspberries by Harry Secombe

Strawberries and Cheam by Harry Secombe

Echoes of the Jazz Age by F Scott Fitzgerald

After Leaving Mr Mackenzie by Jean Rhys

Sex: Lessons from History by Fern Riddell

The U S Constitution : A Very Short Guide by David J Bodenhamer

What The Water Gave Me: Poems After Frida Kahlo by Pascale Petit

The British Constitution: A Very Short Guide by Martin Loughlin

The Penguin Guide to the United States Constitution by Richard Beeman

Gold by Rumi (trans Helah Liza Garfori)

Friedrich Ebert 1871-1925 A Social Democratic Statesman by Walter Mühlhausen

The Wild Iris by Louise Glück

Fair Play by Tove Jansson

The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K Le Guin

The Long Game: 1996-2003 The Inside Story of How The BBC Brought Back Doctor Who by Paul Hayes

I Have Crossed An Ocean by Grace Nichols

Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne

Elena Knows by Claudia Piñeiro (trans Frances Riddle)

Aspects by John M Ford

A Little Devil in America: In Praise of Black Performance by Hanif Abdurraqib

The Happiness Patrol by Graeme Curry

Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung [trans Anton Hur]

The Murder of William of Norwich: The Origins of the Blood Libel in Medieval Europe by E M Rose

Heaven by Meiko Kawakami

The English Constitution by Walter Bagehot

First Language: Poems by Ciarán Carson

'Cherry' Ingram: The Englishman Who Saved Japan’s Blossoms by Naoko Abe

Fallen Idols: Twelve Statues That Made History by Alex Von Tunzelmann

The Other Name: Septology I-II by Jon Fosse (trans Damion Searls)

Five Books by Anna Blandiana [Trans Paul Scott Derrick/Viorica Patea

Pit Lullabies by Jessica Traynor

Is I Another: Septology III-V by Jon Fosse (trans Damion Searls)

Music for the Dead and Resurrected byValzhyna Mort

Extracting The Stone of Madness by Alejandra Piznarik

A New Name: Septology VI-VII by Jon Fosse (trans Damion Searls)

John Berryman: Poems selected by Michael Hoffman by John Berryman

Going to Church in Medieval England by Nicholas Orme

Attack and Decay by Andrew Cartmel

Notes on the Sonnets by Luke Kennard

Sonnets by William Shakespeare

Goddodin: Lament for the Fallen by Gillian Clarke [Trans]

Druids - A Very Short Introduction by Barry Cunliffe

The Death of Francis Bacon by Max Porter

Endgame by Samuel Beckett

Writings from Ancient Egypt Anonymous (trans Toby Wilkinson)

Unsuitable for Females': The Rise of the Lionesses and Women's Football in England by Carrie Dunn

The Changeling by Clare Pollard

Travelling Light by Tove Jansson

Inversions by Iain M Banks

The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare

Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett

The Tale of Sinuhe by Anonymous (trans R P Wilkinson)

The Appointment by Katharina Volckmer

Jung - A Very Short Introduction by Anthony Stevens

Introducing Jung: A Graphic Guide by Maggie Hyde

Introducing Nietzsche: A Graphic Guide by Laurence Gane

Demian by Herman Hesse

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

Treacle Walker by Alan Garner

Oh William! by Elizabeth Strout

Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley

Faustus by Christopher Marlowe

Case Study by Graeme Macrae Burnett

The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

Faustus: The Life and Times of a Renaissance Magician by Leo Ruickbie

The Trees by Percival Everett

After Sappho by Selby Wynn Schwartz

Faustus, Part One by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The Colony by Maggie Magee

Entered from The Sun by George Garrett

Letters from Klara by Tove Jansson

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

The Bloater by Rosemary Tonks

Call for the Dead by John le Carre

The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K Le Guin

Glory by NoViolet Bulawayo

Sonnets for Albert by Anthony Joseph

Voyage in the Dark by Jean Rhys

Idylls by Theocritus

Frogs by Aristophanes

The Eclogues and The Georgics by Virgil [Cecil Day Lewis, Trans]

Sonnets from the Portugese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Prophet Against Slavery by David Lester

The Barefoot Woman by Scholastique Mukasonga

Look to Winward by Iain M Banks

A Little Resurrection by Selina Nwulu

Women of the Harlem Renaissance by Marissa Constantiou [Ed]

Goblin Market and Other Poems by Christina Rossetti

A Fortunate Woman: A Country Doctor’s Story by Polly Morland

The Invisible Man by H G Wells

The Importance of Being Ernest by Oscar Wilde

The Classic Horror Stories by H P Lovecraft

The Metropolitan Critic by Clive James

The Winter Book by Tove Jansson

Notes from an Island by Tove Jansson

Europe, Love Me Back by Rakhshan Rizwan

Licence Renewed by John Gardner

All Systems Read: Murderbot, Book 1 by Martha Wells

Three Poets of the First World War by Jon Stallworthy / Jane Potter [Ed]

The Middle Parts of Fortune - Somme and Ancre, 1916 by Frederic Manning

Survivors' Songs by Jon Stallworthy

The Ordeal of Ivor Gurney by Michael Hurd

The Western Front by Nick Lloyd

Doctor Who and the Invasion of Time by Terrance Dicks

Disenchantment by C E Montague

The Thought-Fox and Other Poems by Ted Hughes

Aliss at the Fire by Jon Fosse (trans Damion Searls)

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Candide by Voltaire

The Dying Gaul and Other Writings by David Jones

Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke

Dear Reader: The Comfort and Joy of Books by Cathy Rentzenbrink

Rasselas by Samuel Johnson

Bibliomaniac by Robin Ince

Rumi: Selected Poems by Rumi (trans R A Nicholson)

Dark Goals by Luciano Wernicke

My Best Of...2022

Well, here we are again. At the end of the year. So, I've put my list of the best books I read in 2022 below. I've split them into three categories: fiction, non-fiction and poetry. I've not included re-reads, so no In Parenthesis - even though it is a fabulous book - for example.

If you want to know my opinions on these books in more detail there is a short review for each one on my Goodreads page, which is here 

I also reviewed some for The Dreamcage and you can find a full list of everything I've reviewed for them here

I have put links to buy the books. Where possible these are direct to the publisher but you can obviously buy them elsewhere. I've avoided Amazon because...well...they don't really need any more help do they. Well done to Bloodaxe Books btw for having so many entries in the poetry section! 

Books highlighted red are out of print but can be found second hand. Probably. O and Demian, Snow Country and The Diary of Lady Murasaki are all Penguin Modern Classic or Penguin Classic so are pretty easy to find wherever you are book shopping. 

If I were to pick one from each Top 10 as a favourite I'd say The Trees by Percival Everett for Fiction, which I couldn't put down and read in one huge gulp; Extracting the Stone of Madness by Alejandra Piznarik for Poetry and The Ordeal of Ivor Gurney by Michael Hurd for non-fiction.

Although a shout out for Paul Hayes's The Long Game, which is one of the best Doctor Who non-fiction books I've read and I've read far, far too many. But as that's Doctor Who specific it gets an honourable mention.

I should also note I finished my Tove Jansson read. I've read fifteen of her books since November 2020. I missed out on the Moomin Books when I was a kid. No idea why, but I did. However, after listening to the mighty Backlisted Podcast - the best book podcast imo - I started on a quest to read everything she'd written. And she's marvellous. I can't recommend her work - both Moomin and non-Moomin - enough. I don't often regret not having children but I would have liked the chance to read Moomin books to my kids. O well. Life is life. 

Most of my book recommendations this year came from BookTube, Twitter and Backlisted. I'm too old for Tiktok. Alas, I fear Elon Musk might put the kibbosh on Twitter for me, but for the moment we soldier on.

Anyway...here's the lists. 

Fiction

Septology by Jon Fosse

The Trees by Percival Everett

Demian by Herman Hesse (translated by W J Strachan)

The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka

Elena Knows by Claudia Piñeiro (translated by Frances Riddle)

Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata (translated by Edward G Seidensticker) 

After Sappho by Selby Wynn Schwartz

Tokyo Ueno Station by Miri Yu (translated by Morgan Giles)

Entered from the Sun by George Garrett

Treacle Walker by Alan Garner

Poetry

Goddodin: A Lament for the Fallen translated by Gillian Clark

One Hundred Poems, One Poem Each, compiled by Fujiwara no Teika (translated by Peter MacMillan)

What the Water Gave Me: Poems After Frida Kahlo by Pascale Petit

Five Books by Anna Blandiana

Pit Lullabies by Jessica Traynor

Extracting the Stone of Madness by Alejandra Piznarik (translated by Yvette Siegert)

The Changeling by Clare Pollard

A Little Resurrection by Selina Nwulu

I Have Crossed an Ocean: Selected Poems by Grace Nichols

Music for the Dead and Resurrected by Valzhyna Mort

Non-Fiction

The Diary of Lady Murasaki by Murasaki Shikibu (translated by Richard Bowring)

What is History, Now? by Helen Carr and Suzannah Lipscomb (Editors)

The Long Game: 1996-2003 The Inside Story of How The BBC Brought Back Doctor Who by Paul Hayes

A Little Devil in America by Hanif Abdurraqib

Fallen Idols: Twelve Statues that Made History by Alex von Tunzelmann

The Barefoot Woman by Scholastique Mukasonga

A Fortunate Woman: A Country Doctor's Story by Polly Morland

The Ordeal of Ivor Gurney by Michael Hurd

The Murder of William of Norwich: The Origins of the Blood Libel in Medieval Europe by E M Rose

The Western Front: A History of the Great War, 1914-1918 by Nick Lloyd

NaNoWriMo - Chapter 1, Untitled Black Comedy Supernatural Book

There’s something hypnotic about watching a body hanging from a tree. Horrifying, but hypnotic. Swaying. The rope creaking. A dark silhouette against the dawn sky. The tree, a hunched twisted Cornish coastal survivor, looks like it can barely take the weight.

I can hear gulls screeching.

This was the second time Edward Quintrell had been hung. This time I was going to burn the fucker as well. There’s only so much supernatural bullshit a man can take.

Behind me the cottage is still burning. Time to cut down the corpse and throw it on the bonfire.

As I cut the rope and the body crumples to the ground like a dropped towel I start laughing. I’m not sure if it is a healthy laugh or just hysteria. I do know this was not how my holiday was meant to go.

I have no intention of treating Quintrell’s body with respect so I drag it towards the burning building along the floor. I’ve got no one to help me carry him anyway. Everyone else is either dead or in hospital.

By the time I get him near enough to the fire I’m sweating from the struggle. I take Quintrell’s sword and hack his head off. When you’re dealing with the corpse of a man who was supposed to have died four hundred years ago there’s no point in taking any chances. I throw the head into the fire. Then I slam a stake into his heart. I don’t know if Quintrell is a vampire. But I’m not taking any chances.

Then I roll the rest of the body into the fire. I watch it start to burn.

This, I suppose, is what victory feels like.

As the corpse burns I suspect I’ll never enjoy a BBQ ever again.

I turn around at the sound of footsteps. The old man is standing behind me. The grey beard loon. Or what we had thought was a loon. He thrusts a flask at me.

“’ave some tea lad. You deserve it after that.”

I laugh and pour myself a cup.

“I’m never coming here on holiday again.” I say.

He laughs his gurgling laugh.

“I suppose I should call the police.”

“I suppose you should.”

“How do explain all this…” I say, sweeping my arm to take in the burning cottage, the wrecked car, the bodies. “You know, two weeks ago I’d never hurt a fly. Quintrell was the ninth person I’ve killed. If you count Quintrell.”

“Oh, I count Quintrell. Twice dead now. Maybe more.”

“Hopefully the last.”

“I think so. Hung, beheaded, staked and burned. If the bugger comes back after that he probably deserves it.”

I laugh.

“You look like shit.” The old man says to me.

“I’m sure I do. I need a shower.”

I look the old man up and down.

“What happens to you now?”

“Oh, I’ll wait. And watch. As I always have.”

I nod. And we both stand silently for a while.

I start walking down the hill. This isn’t the best place to make a call and the nearest village is a good few miles away. The old man has gone. I can sense others around me. Then there is a gust of cold wind and they’re gone.

It’s over.

NaNoWriMo - Chapter 1, Untitled Fantasy Novel

 CHAPTER ONE

He was lost. Somehow, he had got separated from the rest of the team. And now he was wandering a Welsh woodland totally lost. It was cold. It wasn’t winter cold, but it was still too cold to be lost in the woods.

He had tried turning around and just returning to where he’d last seen everyone else. That seemed to just make things worse. He found himself confused. He hated these team building sessions. If he wanted to bond with people, there were pubs for that. At least it wasn’t raining.

He didn’t have a compass because he was part of a group who were being led by someone who was supposed to be an expert in these events. That expert also had the map. He would have used his phone, but that wasn’t able to find a signal. At least not where he was now.

He just thought if he stuck to the path eventually either he’d hit the edge of the wood, a road, or some sign of civilisation. Like a proper mobile phone signal. The path was, finally, heading downhill though so that was a relief.

He had shouted a few times but got no response. He wondered, as he wandered, whether the rest of them were playing a trick on him. He was pretty convinced they weren’t. Especially as time ticked on.

As the path dipped deeper into what looked like a valley it seemed to get a little narrower. The wood around him seemed denser and darker. He really hoped that he wasn’t going to die in these woods, but that seemed needlessly dramatic. This was the hills of Wales not the Amazonian rain forest. He tried shouting again but the trees seemed to deaden all sound.

He could now hear the soft sounds of a river so he assumed he was getting close to the valley bottom, which would mean climbing the other side. He hoped – even assumed – it wasn’t too steep though.

After another ten minutes or so he could see the river and the overgrown wooden bridge that crossed it. He found the bridge reassuring. It meant people. Although the overgrowth was a little worrying.

Around the bridge on his side the wood seemed to have thinned out. A fallen tree looked ideally placed for him to sit, rest, and get his head together. He had his lunch, snacks, and a bottle of water in his rucksack so he might take a rest.

He sat down, dropped his rucksack in front on him and took a drink of water and then started chomping on a cereal bar. It was then he realised how quiet it had gone. A deep, disturbing silence seem to surround him. He suddenly felt like he was being watched.

He turned around.

There she stood. She was a tall attractive woman. Her hair was thick, black, and long. It seemed to run down to the floor and then away from her towards the river. She was pale and her eyes were black and deep. She was wearing a long dress. Or that’s what he thought it was, but it was twisted with greens and browns. It might have been made up of the woods themselves. The sleeves were long and flared. The dress touched the woodland floor so he couldn’t see her feet, but he felt she was bare foot. She wore a crown of flowers.

He stood up.

“Hi…er…I’m lost…”

“I know,” she said. Although he wasn’t sure she’d said it out loud.

“Oh. Well, I need to get back to Pont-y-Pont. Do you know which way I should be going?”

There was a long silence, which she seemed comfortable with, and he didn’t. It seemed to be a silence within an already uncomfortable larger silence.

“You don’t have to move,” she said “Your friends aren’t far away.”

“Oh…how do you know?”

“I know.”

“OK…has anyone every told you that you’re very…enigmatic?”

There was another long silence.

“Sit down.” She said.

He sat down. He was facing her.

“Do you know how far away they are?”

“About half a mile. They’ll be here soon.”

“OK.”

He had a feeling he was missing something. Something obvious.

“My name’s Will.” He said.

“I know.”

“Do you have a name?”

“Yes”

He felt a little sting at the back of his brain, like the beginning of a headache.

“What is it?”

There was a silence. Again.

“It doesn’t matter. Not yet.”

Silence.

“Your friends are almost here I must go.”

“OK.”

“If you like you can tell them you were led astray by a Goddess.”

“Can I?”

“Yes.”

“OK. I’m…”

Then she disappeared. Seeming to slide away into the river. Laughing. On the floor in front of him was her crown of flowers.

He picked it up and sat back on the log. He wondered if he’d banged his head somewhere. He certainly felt like he was in a daze.

He drank some more water. Five minutes or so later his team arrived, and they found him sat on a log, with a slightly confused expression on his face. He had a circle of flowers in his hand. When they arrived he looked up.

“Ah. There you are.” He said.

Their guide, Andy, said.

“Are you OK?”

“Yes. Yes. I’m fine. It’s just been an odd half-an-hour. How did you find me?”

“Oh,” said Andy, “Some weird, bearded bloke said if we were looking for Will we’d find him sitting by the bridge down there. And pointed us down a path.”

“Ah.”

“I think,” said Louise, one of our admin team, “that bloke might have been a bit pissed. Or stoned.”

“Perhaps he was a God,” said Will. “It’s been that kind of day.”

There was an awkward silence.

“Shall we go,” said Andy. “We need to start heading back to the hotel.”

There was general assent and the pack of them started heading off. Before they left Will carefully put the crown of flowers into his rucksack.

And that is how our story begins.