Showing posts with label Annual Awards. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Annual Awards. Show all posts

Wednesday, 31 December 2014

The 2014 Tony's Reading List Awards

A very good day to you all - welcome to The Tony's Reading List Awards for 2014!  The blog has been running for exactly six years now, and as always I'm celebrating the anniversary with my round-up of the good, the bad and the downright awful by handing out a few of my cherished prizes.  So, without further ado, let's see who soared and who bombed in 2014 :)

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Once again, we begin with the Most-Read Author Award, and heading the list this year are a couple of rather familiar names:


 I have to say that this award hasn't been completely finalised yet as the Koreans have put in a steward's enquiry.  While the Japanese pair take it 4-3 according to the stats on my list, O's three include various novellas and stories which could easily have been counted differently...

 Nope, the verdict's in.  Haruki takes the prize, regaining the award he won back in 2009, and the Grand Master of J-Lit joins him thanks to a couple of December reads - well done, sirs :)

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After that close tussle, let's move onto a more clear-cut race, the struggle for the Most-Read Country award:

1) South Korea (30)
2) Japan (20)
3) Germany (11)
4) France (7)
5) Italy (5)

 Boom!  After one book in six years (and one that was worst in class at that), the Koreans romped home in 2014, with only a late Japanese surge making the race look even a little bit competitive.  My new-found interest in K-Lit has been the story of the blog this year, and I suspect that things will look fairly similar in 2015 as well.  The ten books I read and reviewed from the Dalkey Archive Press Library of Korean Literature beat out every other country, aside from Japan and Germany, on their own ;)
 
If we look at the annual statistics for English-language books versus the rest of the world, you'll see that my focus on literature in translation continues to sharpen.  Of the 130 books I read, only 8 were originally published in English, meaning that an astounding 122 (of which I read 15 in the original language) were originally written in a language other than English.  Even last year's 90% hit-rate has been surpassed - those are big numbers, no matter which way you look at it...

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While it's all well and good to reward the enjoyable books of the year, New Year's Eve is also a time to reflect on the complete stinkers, which is why I always look forward to the Golden Turkey Award.  This year, once again, there were four contenders for the drumsticks:


 And the winner is...

 One Spoon on This Earth!  Another award for the Koreans, then, although it's not one they would have wanted.  However, it's only right that I give an honourable mention to the person who made it all possible, translator Jennifer M. Lee.  Believe me when I say that this award really belongs to her... 

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Having dished out the minor awards, it's time to get down the real focus of the night, the Book of the Year Award. As has been the case for a few years now, each of my monthly wrap-ups has seen one book singled out as the pick of the month, and only these titles have been found worthy of contending for the ultimate honour (links are to my reviews). Many wonderful books have missed out because of this system, to which I can say only one thing - tough luck.


Twelve of the best, I'm sure you'll agree :)  There are three nods each to France and Hungary, and two books from Austria, with works from Japan, Netherlands, Spain and South Korea rounding out the dozen.  Unsurprisingly, there's no room for an Anglophone book on the list this year...

Of course, where there's a longlist, there's also a shortlist, and here's mine: 

A True Novel
Where Tigers Are At Home
Seiobo There Below
The Old Masters
Zone

At which point, after a few stiff drinks, I had a good, long think before making my final decision - and here it is. The Tony's Reading List Book of the Year for 2014 is (highlight the blank area below with your cursor to see the winner):

A True Novel by Minae Mizumura
(translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter, published by Other Press)

 Much more than an updated Japanese version of Wuthering Heights, A True Novel explores how much you can trust other people's versions of a story - and the wonderful product Other Press have developed makes the book even better.  Well done to everyone involved :)


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That's all for this year - it's time to look ahead now to the seventh year of the blog, a year that's going to get off to a quick start as January in Japan is about to begin!  Here's hoping it's a good one for all of you, and I do hope you'll join me again occasionally in 2015 :)
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Tuesday, 31 December 2013

The 2013 Tony's Reading List Awards

Welcome one and all to the post you've all been waiting for, the culmination of a year's reading and reviewing - The Tony's Reading List Awards for 2013!  For the fifth year in a row, I'm summing up a year of literary delights, praising the good, mocking the bad, and consigning the ugly to the great remainder basket in the sky.

 So, without further ado, let's get started...

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As always, the first prize is the Most-Read Author Award, and as I need to have read three books by the same author in the year, the shortlist is, well, pretty short...


Aira is a writer I first encountered this year, and he takes out the award straight away - well done, sir :)

There were a lot of writers stuck on two books (including perpetual winner Anthony Trollope), but only these three made it past that mark.  It's also worth noting that the four books I read by the winner probably only comprised 400 pages in total...

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Next up, it's the Most-Read Country Award - which country have I visited most in my literary travels this year?

 1) Japan (26)
2) Argentina (11)
3) Germany (8)
4) France (6)

 No contest this year - Japan takes the prize, hands down :)  I wouldn't have expected Argentina to be up there, but with Aira and Borges high on my reading agenda, I suppose it was inevitable.  Surprisingly, England fails to even make the list, being one of several countries on five books.

If we look at the annual statistics for English-language books versus the rest of the world, my focus on literature in translation becomes very clear.  Of the 130 books I read, only 13 were originally published in English, meaning that an amazing 117 (of which I read 22 in the original language) were originally written in a language other than English. 

That's exactly 90% - wow...

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The third award tonight is the one which most people enjoy - yes, it's time to dish out the drumsticks and find out who has won the Golden Turkey Award this year!  And the nominees are...


And the winner is... Rustic Baroque!  Why?  Well, firstly I have to apologise to Jiří Hájíček as I quite enjoyed his book.  Sadly, I felt that Gale A. Kirking's translation really let down an interesting story...

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But enough of the dross - it's time to get on with the big one, namely the Book of the Year Award!  As has been the case for a couple of years now, I have nominated a great read in each of my monthly wrap-ups, and these are the books that have fought their way through to my annual longlist (links are to my reviews).  It's a harsh system, but I'm a harsh man...

 January - The Old Capital by Yasunari Kawabata (Japan)
February - War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (Russia)
March - The Detour by Gerbrand Bakker (Netherlands)
April - Seven Types of Ambiguity by Elliot Perlman (Australia)
May - A Heart so White by Javier Marías (Spain)
June - Stone upon Stone by Wiesław Myśliwski (Poland)
July - Three Strong Women by Marie NDiaye (France)
August - The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann (Germany)
September - The Sorrow of Angels by Jón Kalman Stefánsson (Iceland)
October - The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante (Italy)
November - Woodcutters by Thomas Bernhard (Austria)
December - Blinding: The Left Wing by Mircea Cărtărescu (Romania)

I'm sure you'll agree - that is a great list of books :)  Where do they come from?  Well, interestingly this year's final dozen come from twelve different countries and were written in eleven different languages (two were written in German).  Only one Anglophone book among this bunch...

And what's a shortlist without a longlist?  Nothing, that's what ;)  Here, then, are the cream of the crop for this year...

War and Peace
Seven Types of Ambiguity
A Heart so White
The Magic Mountain
The Sorrow of Angels
Blinding

At which point, the many sides of my persona fought it out behind the locked doors of my self-conscious, only emerging (bruised and bleeding...) when a winner had been chosen.  And here it is - the Tony's Reading List Book of the Year for 2013 is (highlight below to see the winner):

War and Peace

I was tempted to go for one of the newer novels, but sometimes you just have to admit that a book is a classic for a reason - and Tolstoy's epic is nothing if not a classic :)

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And that's it - year five on the blog is complete :)  Thanks to everyone who has read or commented on my posts this year...

 ...but stay tuned for January in Japan!
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Sunday, 30 December 2012

The 2012 Tony's Reading List Awards

Welcome to the fourth annual Tony's Reading List Awards, a time for me to look back at the year's reading and sort through the winners and the grinners, the dull and the dreary, the terrific and the terrible - you get the drift (if you'd like to look back at what happened in 2009, 2010 and 2011, be my guest!).

 There are a number of awards to be handed out this evening, and I'll be commenting all the while on little interesting stats about my reading year, so let's get on with it, shall we?  Drum roll, please ;)

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As always, the first prize up is 2012's Most-Read Author Award - and the winner is:

1) Anthony Trollope (4)
2) Sjón (3)

Trollope takes home the gong for the third consecutive year - well done, sir!
The lack of contenders here is because my cut-off point was three books by one writer, and only two managed to fit that criteria this year.  This is due to a much wider spread of reading this year and can also be seen in the results of my next category...

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...which is the Most-Read Country Award!

1=) Germany (18)
1=) Japan (18)
3) England (17)
4) Iceland (9)
5) Australia (7)

In a hard-fought battle (with a much wider field of participants), Germany retains the crown it wrested from England last year - but only just.  Japan was very close, and if the year had included January 2013, we may have had a new champion :)  Stop the Press!  My reading in preparation for January in Japan since writing this post sent J-Lit surging up the charts to share equal billing at the top of the list!

Looking at my original language stats, it's clear to see that my focus shifted even more clearly to translated fiction this year.  Of the 125 books read, just 30 were originally published in English, meaning that a staggering 95 (of which I read 27 in the original language) were originally written in a foreign language.  I'm fairly sure that this is a trend which will continue into 2013 and beyond...

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It's now time to hand out the individual honours, and one of the highlights of the literary calendar round these parts is the bestowal of the Golden Turkey Award.  This highly-coveted honour is given to the book which, in my very personal, most subjective opinion, was the biggest waste of my precious reading time over the past twelve months.  And the nominees are: 


The winner (of course) is the truly awful Please Look After Mother, one of the first books I read this year, and without doubt the one I really wish I hadn't bothered with... 

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Let's move on now to more pleasant affairs, namely the year's good books.  Each month, in my wrap-up post, I nominate a book or two as my recommendation, and these books form my longlist for the Book of the Year.  This year's nominees (links to my reviews) are:

January - Carpentaria by Alexis Wright
February - In Zeiten des abnehmenden Lichts (In Times of Fading Light) by Eugen Ruge
March - The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro
April - The Stranger's Child by Alan Hollinghurst
May - Die Blechtrommel (The Tin Drum) by Günter Grass
June - Once Were Warriors by Alan Duff
and Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
July - Petersburg by Andrei Bely
and Dublinesque by Enrique Vila-Matas
August - Independent People by Halldór Laxness
September - A l'ombre de jeunes filles en fleurs (Within a Budding Grove) by Marcel Proust
October - Stone Tree by Gyrðir Elíasson
November - Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin
December -  The Old Man and his Sons by Heðin Brú
and My Brilliant Career by Miles Franklin

The fifteen books on the list come from nine different countries, with Germany's three nominations topping the list.  Australia, England, Spain and Iceland all provided two nominees, while books from Russia, France, New Zealand and the Faroe Islands(!) round out the selection.

In the first three years of the blog, I cheated massively by choosing a series as my pick for the year, but this year I am determined to stick my neck out.  Of the fifteen books above, five stood out enough to make it onto my shortlist:

The Unconsoled
Petersburg
Dublinesque
Independent People
Berlin Alexanderplatz

 Finally, after lengthy deliberations (and some rather vicious exchanges) in the jury room, a winner was chosen.  The Tony's Reading List Book of the Year for 2012 is:

Andrei Bely's Petersburg

 It was an extremely close-run race between Petersburg and Dublinesque, but in the end I had to go for the Russian classic over the Spanish modern classic.  Congratulations to publishers Pushkin Press for their excellent taste :)

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And that's it for 2012, another great year in reading :)  Thanks to everyone who has visited and commented this year - I hope you'll continue to do so in 2013...

...and speaking of 2013, it's already shaping up to be a busy year.  I'm looking forward to taking part in the Shadow Panel again for next year's Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, but before that, there's another event taking up my time.  I'll be spending the first month of 2013 with January in Japan, my first ever blog event.  If you'd like to join me, you know where to look :)
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Sunday, 1 January 2012

The 2011 Tony's Reading List Awards

Welcome to the third annual Tony's Reading List Awards, a special time when we celebrate the literary successes of the previous year's reading and shine a light on some rather less impressive books, making sure they get the derision they deserve.  It's only fair :)

So, without further ado, let's begin!

First up is the Most-Read Author Award for 2011:

1=) Anthony Trollope and Steven Carroll (5)
3=) Haruki Murakami, Yasunari Kawabata and Franz Kafka (4)

Trollope retains the title he won last year, but only in a tie with first-time contender, Aussie Steven Carroll.  With about fifty novels published though, I'd bet Trollope is the more likely to be there or thereabouts again next year :)

Next, it's time for the Most-Read Country Award:

1) Germany (26)
2) England (21)
3) Australia (20)
4) Japan (16)

A big change here in 2011!  For the first time, my country of birth has been knocked off its throne, thanks largely to my renewed interest in German-language literature and two (!) G-lit months last year.  In fact, England almost fell to third place thanks to a new-found interest in contemporary Australian fiction.

Another interesting statistic is that of the 123 books I read last year, 64 were originally written in a language other than English (of which I read 38 in the original language).  For the first time, translated fiction wins!

The Golden Turkey Award goes to the book that was... well, the biggest waste of time this year.  This is a highly subjective decision; basically this award goes to the book I most regret having read!  2011 was, by and large a good year for reading, but there were several less-than-excellent books.  I eventually came up with a short-list of three contenders:


And the winner (or loser...) is... Michael Kohlhaas!  In a bad day for the German nobility, it's Kleist's novella which takes home the drumsticks.  Despite a high body count and a meeting with Martin Luther, this is one German classic I won't be rereading in a hurry.

Now it's time to move onto the big one, the Book of the Year, and my task has been made a little easier this year by the introduction of my monthly wrap-up posts.  The choice for Book of the Year is limited to my monthly recommendations - all sixteen of them (yes, I know...):

April - When We Were Orphans by Kazuo Ishiguro

A wonderful collection of books, I'm sure you'll agree :)  By nationality, there were four from Japan, four from Australia, three from Austria, two from England and one each from China, the Czech Republic and New Zealand.  In terms of writers, both Steven Carroll and Kenzaburo Oe were represented twice on the list.

So, what book takes out the main award?  The Book of the Year Award for 2011 goes to:

Steven Carroll's The Glenroy Trilogy :)

Yes, for the third year in a row, I've cheated massively and made a series my book of the year!  Apologies to Shusaku Endo and Kenzaburo Oe, but Carroll's trilogy is the one to read.  For the record, the trilogy consists of:

and Spirit of Progress (a prequel to the original trilogy)

Quality contemporary fiction from Down Under - please check it out :)

That's all for 2011: it's time to look forward now and move on into another great year of reading (alternatively, you might want to look back at what I thought of 2009 and 2010...).  See you all again throughout 2012!
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Thursday, 30 December 2010

The 2010 Tony's Reading List Awards

Welcome, one and all, to the Tony's Reading List Awards for 2010! Just as occurred last year, I am celebrating the past twelve months of reading, looking at what was read, where it came from, and who the big favourites of 2010 were. We will also be awarding a couple of prestigious prizes: the 'Golden Turkey Award' (self-explanatory really) and the 'Book of the Year Award' (ditto). 

 

So, without further ado, let's begin! Firstly, the 'Most-Read Author Award' goes to Anthony Trollope:

3=) Virginia Woolf (4)

When you decide to read all the Barchester Chronicles, it's hard to read more of another writer than Trollope!  Once again, two Japanese writers make the list while David Mitchell takes the silver after I read all of his novels this year.

When it comes to nationality, once again England takes out the 'Most-Read Country Award':
1) England (32)
2) Japan (15)
3) Australia (9)
4) Germany (7)

Very similar to last year's list - let's see if anything changes in 2011!  Of the 93 this year, 35 were originally not in English (of which I read 12 in the original language).

The 'Golden Turkey Award' goes to the book which was the biggest waste of time this year.  This is a highly subjective decision; basically, this award goes to the book I really, really regret having read!  In 2010, I have been fortunate enough to have enjoyed almost everything I've read (a result which justifies my policy of avoiding modern novels unless I'm convinced I'll enjoy them!), which means that I'm only nominating three books for this prestigious award:

His Illegal Self by Peter Carey
The Wings Of The Dove by Henry James
Purge by Sofi Oksanen

And the winner is... well, it was always going to be Mr. James :) To paraphrase Bon Jovi:
"Bored to the heart, and you're to blame
Henry, you give literature a bad name"
Book of the Year - Very Honourable Mentions
With such a lot of good books read, this has been incredibly difficult to judge.  I initially intended to give ten honourable mentions, but I just couldn't whittle down the list any more...  So here are fourteen of the best :)

Dead Europe by Christos Tsiolkas (Australia)
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell (England)
The Waves by Virginia Woolf (England)
Sanshiro by Natsume Soseseki (Japan)
Drei Kameraden by Erich Maria Remarque (Germany)
Quicksand by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki (Japan)
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry (India)
Le Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac (France)
Devils by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Russia)
Kusamakura by Natsume Soseki (Japan)
An Equal Music by Vikram Seth (India)
Café Scheherazade by Arnold Zable (Australia)
Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann (Germany)
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (England)

But what gets the big award?

The 'Book of the Year Award' for 2010 goes to:

The Barchester Chronicles by Anthony Trollope :)

David Mitchell can consider himself very unlucky (although I suspect not being shortlisted for the Booker Prize may have irked him a little more), but you can't go past Trollope's magnificent series of pastoral and clerical adventures for great reading.  Yes, by selecting a series I suppose I have cheated (for the second year in a row), but it's my blog, and that's all the explanation you're getting ;)

So thanks once again for your time today, and all throughout 2010. I hope you've come away with some more ideas for your reading year in 2011. Happy New Year!
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Thursday, 31 December 2009

The 2009 Tony's Reading List Awards

Welcome, one and all, to the Tony's Reading List Awards for 2009! This is where we celebrate the previous twelve months of reading, look at what was read, where it came from and who the big favourites of 2009 were. We will also be awarding a couple of prestigious prizes: the 'Golden Turkey Award' (self-explanatory really) and the 'Book of the Year Award' (ditto).

So, without further ado, let's begin! Firstly, the 'Most-Read Author Award' goes to Haruki Murakami:
1) Haruki Murakami (6)
2) Yukio Mishima (5)
3=) Heinrich Böll (4)
3=) Charles Dickens (4)
3=) Thomas Hardy (4)

Belezza's Japanese Literature Challenge 3 inspired me to read more Japanese literature than I otherwise would have: the Murakami books were all rereads, but the Mishima novels (including all four 'The Sea of Fertility' works) were new to me. While Dickens and Hardy are old friends, 2009 saw German author Heinrich Böll leap into my conciousness: four down and more to come ;)

When it comes to nationality, it's no surprise that England takes out the 'Most-Read Country Award':
1) England (32)
2) Japan (15)
3) Australia (8)
4) Germany (7)
5) Russia (4)

I am (as you may know) English by birth, and I lived for three years in Japan a while back. I am now an Australian citizen, having lived here for more than seven years, and I studied German at university, later living there for two years. I have absolutely no connection with Russia whatsoever... I just checked my list, and, of the 91 books read this year, 39 were originally published in a language other than English (of which 14 were read in the original).

The 'Golden Turkey Award' goes to the book which was the biggest waste of time this year. Luckily, my prediliction for classics means that bad books have been few and far between. However, there were a few...
1) 'The Universe' by Richard Osborne
2) 'Wish You Were Here' by Mike Gayle
3) 'Blind Faith' by Ben Elton
4) 'My Favourite Wife' by Tony Parsons
5) 'Oliver Twist' by Charles Dickens

Please read my review of the awful 'The Universe' (just DON'T READ THE BOOK!). 'Persuasion' by Jane Austen managed to extract itself from the bottom five thanks to an improved performance in the second half. 'Oliver Twist' scrapes in (!) largely because of dashed expectations.

Book of the Year - Very Honourable Mentions
'The God of Small Things' by Arundhati Roy
'Die Verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum' by Heinrich Böll
'The Trilogy of the Rat' by Haruki Murakami
'Midnight's Children' by Salman Rushdie
'Der Prozeß' by Franz Kafka
'100 Years of Solitude' by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
'Breath' by Tim Winton
'Middlemarch' by George Eliot
'Ulysses' by James Joyce
'The Riders' by Tim Winton

A bit of a cheat to include four Murakami books here, but I felt it was only fair to nominate them for the sum of their parts. Tim Winton is the only author with two separate nominations here, and I heartily recommend him to all you non-Aussies! The truth is that I had a preliminary short-list of about 25 books, and even keeping to that list caused me to cut out dozens of great books (I have had a very good reading year!).

But what gets the big award?

The 'Book of the Year Award' for 2009 goes to:

'The Sea of Fertility' Tetralogy by Yukio Mishima

No big surprise to regular readers of my blog, I suspect. Before this year, I had only read Mishima's 'The Temple of the Golden Pavillion', which I found tough going. After buying, reading and posting on 'Forbidden Colours', I decided to take the plunge and tackle all four books in Mishima's career-defining series. All I can say is that I'm very glad I did and that I think you should too!

Thanks for your time: I hope you've come away with some ideas for your reading year in 2010. Happy new Year!
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