Somewhat of a down year for books this past year. Somewhat of a down year in general I guess. Not much in the way of catastrophes but not much in the way of all timers either.

I finally got that job at Amazon I never dreamed of. Moved out to Seattle.

Seattle's cool. Lovely city. Lovely region. The weather is mild and the pho is plentiful.

Still, I doubt I'll be here this time next year. And I'm batting 100% on my book blog predictions. To review:

2015 By The Books: Predicted I would continue to make a drunken fool of myself in random American cities. Check.

2016 By The Books: Predicted I would in one year be living la vida latina in some faroff country. Check.

2017 By The Books: Predicted I would in one year be dodging coworkers during my lunch break to read books. Check.

2018 By The Books: Predicted I would in one year be living in a different city. Check.

Hm I guess I already used the "I'll be living in a different city" prognostication. How about I'll be madly in love and settling down to a long life of happiness in some other city? Worth a shot.

Anyway on to the books I read this past year, from worst to first:

18. Sparrow (1996) - Mary Doria Russell

I felt like it took me the first half of 2019 to finish this piece of trash. I'm not sure why I finished it. Life has its regrets. In the book, the Catholic church funds a space expedition to some recently discovered alien planet. There they act out boring ass lives in frustrating prose.

17. The Inferno (1472) - Dante Alighieri

It's silly, but somewhat less silly than the bible. Dante's hero Virgil, a resident in a minimum security circle of hell, takes Dante on a tour of the underworld. Everyone gets sent to a different circle depending on the one sin they committed in life. Most of the inmates are old rivals of Dante's. Probably not based on a true story.

16. A Tale For The Time Being (2013) - Ruth Ozeki

The structure of this book bothered me. Half the book is an author in Canada living her author life and the other half is a diary she's found written by a suicidal teenage girl in Japan. So on top of wrestling with the clunky narrative structure I was also cringing half the time. It does have some good zen lines. Up. Down. Same thing.

15. Science and Human Behavior (1951) - B.F. Skinner

An old high school friend recommended this to me a few years back and I finally ticked this one off my reading list. It's quite dry but compelling. The basic idea is that free will is a myth and all human behavior can be explained as cause and effect. Skinner is not too put out by the idea.

14. Snakepit 2007 - Ben Snakepit

It's Ben Snakepit's punk rock movie store clerk life in comic strip form. I bet he's not a movie store clerk anymore now that Netflix and Amazon rule the world.

13. Death of Somoza (1996) - Claribel Alegría

Somebody in Nicaragua recommended this one to me. It's not the best prose but pretty fascinating. The story of a commando group of Argentinians who went to Uruguay to assassinate the former dictator of Nicaragua. They are die hard revolutionaries willing to pay the ultimate price to murder a tyrant. Told through interviews with the surviving members of the commando squad.

12. A Gate At The Stairs (2009) - Lorrie Moore

I picked this up in an airport on hastily planned 3-week vacation to Vegas-Jamaica-Peru before starting my new job in Seattle. I thought it was pretty good and was surprised to find that opinions vary greatly on this book. It's too liberal, or it's too white womany, or it's too cliche.

I thought it was good. It's about a college girl working over the summer for an eccentric white couple who are adopting a black baby. I probably would have liked it more if I were a white academic woman.

Alas I'm a gambling drinking reader of books instead. On the gambling front I had my best year of poker ever last year and finished up 5 figures. Try for 6 next year?

11. The Long Fall (2009) - Walter Mosley

This is Book 1 of the Leonid McGill mystery series. I liked it a bit more than Devil in a Blue Dress, the only other Mosley I've read. McGill is a private investigator in NYC with underworld ties. It's a fun read.

10. The Story Of My Teeth (2013) - Valeria Luiselli

A story about a Mexican man who auctions off the teeth of famous people. It's actually quite a bit more confusing than that but it includes some great narratives. Apparently she wrote it in collaboration with workers from some factory in Mexico. Which is pretty cool.

9. Foucault's Pendulum (1988) - Umberto Eco

This took me forever to get through. I didn't think I'd finish it after the first 50 pages but 2 months later I decided is was actually quite good. It's a conspiracy theory epic about Rosicrucians and diabolicals and templar. Along the way there is some really gripping prose. The overall message appeals to me the skeptic. I'm probably the only person in the world who thinks Epstein killed himself.

8. MaddAddam (2013) - Margaret Atwood

The 3rd and final episode in the MaddAddam trilogy. This one takes place mostly after the apocalypse where the survivors and the synthetic humanish children of Crake struggle to fend off the more violent of the world's survivors. I liked The Year of the Flood better but still a solid novel.

7. Small Island (2004) - Andrea Levy

This is a story about Jamaican immigrants in England in the years following World War II. Turns out being poor in England isn't all it's cracked up to be. Fresh fruit and sunlight are in short supply.

6. The Crucible (1953) - Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller's classic play about the Salem Witch trials. It's as good as everyone thinks it is. It strikes to the bone. Every act ends with a bang!

5. Fortune Smiles (2015) - Adam Johnson

A collection of excellent but morbid short stories. One is about the former warden of an East Berlin prison. The title story follows two North Korean defectors trying to adjust to life in South Korea. I suppose a white American guy writing from a North Korean perspective doesn't cause controversy a la American Dirt because North Korean defectors don't tweet at Oprah.

4. 1Q84 (2009) - Haruki Murakami

It's super long but it reads quite fast. A woman finds herself in a world almost like the 1984 she knows but just slightly different. Meanwhile a math teacher and a teenage girl collaborate to write a novel that is more than fiction. I swapped for this one at a hostel I stayed at briefly in Kingston, Jamaica. You can find a copy at pretty much any hostel.

3. Two Years Two Months and 28 Nights (2015) - Salman Rushdie

Phenomenal tale of the djini returning to the modern world to wreak havoc for 1,001 nights. A baby punishes the corrupt with illness. A plague of levitation sweeps the planet. The jinnia declare a sex boycott against the djinn. It's highly imaginative.

2. Kitchen Confidential (2000) - Anthony Bourdain

This hit me really hard and I was going to make it my #1, but I just don't care enough about food. I loved this book for the gritty stories of restaurant life in New York City. Anthony Bourdain is a legend. Rest in peace.

1. A Little Hatred (2019) - Joe Abercrombie

A new novel set in the world of the First Law! Saw this one at Powell's on a random weekend trip to Portland and I just about soiled myself. This installment features a worker uprising in a rapidly industrializing world. Of course there is no happy ending, but I guess I'm getting used to that. I fucking love these books!

That's all for now. I'm headed back to Minneapolis in 24 hours to ride bikes in the snow and complain about my job. How about this for a 2020 prediction: I will write a blog besides my annual book reviews! Maybe. Anyway tata.