Books Read in 2009

I read 101 books in 2009, beating my 2007 and 2008 totals by 1.

Top 10 fiction:
Inversions - Iain M. Banks
Shockwave Rider - John Brunner
War With the Newts - Karel Capek
Engleby - Sebastian Faulks
9tail Fox - Jon Courtenay Grimwood
City of Baraboo - Barry B. Longyear
The Mourning Vessels - Peter Luther
River of Gods - Ian McDonald
The Crash of Hennington - Patrick Ness
A Patchwork Planet - Anne Tyler

Top 3 non-fiction:
Ulysses Found - Ernle Bradford
Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World - Mark Kurlansky
Sky Burial - Xinran

Here is the full list:
1) Only Revolutions - Mark Z. Danielewski
2) Trader - Charles de Lint
3) The Crash of Hennington - Patrick Ness
4) Sky Burial - Xinran
5) Calypso - Ed McBain
6) Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
7) Penguin Lost - Andrey Kurkov
8) God: The Ultimate Autobiography / Satan : The Hiss and Tell Memoirs – Jeremy Pascall
9) The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters - G.W. Dahlquist
10) Ulysses Found - Ernle Bradford
11) The Virago Book of Fairy Tales - ed. Angela Carter
12) Weird, Wonderful America - Laura A. Bergheim
13) Digging to America - Anne Tyler
14) What Your Clothes Say About You - Trinny & Susannah
15) Consider Phlebas - Iain M. Banks
16) The Player of Games - Iain M. Banks
17) The Careful Use of Compliments - Alexander McCall Smith
18) Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World - Mark Kurlansky
19) What You Wear Can Change Your Life - Trinny Woodall & Susannah Constantine
20) River of Gods - Ian McDonald
21) The Good Husband of Zebra Drive - Alexander McCall Smith
22) West With the night - Beryl Markham
23) Singer From the Sea - Sheri S. Tepper
24) The Man on the Balcony - Sjowall & Wahloo
25) Use of Weapons - Iain M. Banks
26) The Hippopotamus - Stephen Fry
27) The State of the Art - Iain M. Banks
28) Shanghai Baby - Wei Hu
29) Foundation - Isaac Asimov
30) The Night Watch - Sarah Waters
31) Soft - Rupert Thomson
32) Something from the Nightside - Simon R. Green
33) Agents of Light and Darkness - SimonR. Green
34) Foundation and Empire - Isaac Asimov
35) The Survival Guide - Trinny & Susannah
36) Across The Roof of the World - Wilfred Skrede
37) British Folk Tales and Legends: A Sampler - Katharine M. Briggs
38) Excession - Iain M. Banks
39) The Mourning Vessels - Peter Luther
40) Three to See the King - Magnus Mills
41) Second Foundation - Isaac Asimov
42) Dreams - Carl Gustav Jung
43) Cocaine Nights - J.G. Ballard
44) Forests of the Heart - Charles de Lint
45) The Story of Spain - Mark williams
46) Air - Geoff Ryman
47) Galapagos - Kurt Vonnegut
48) Laxdaela Saga
49) Engleby - Sebastian Faulks
50) Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World - Haruki Murakami
51) Inversions - Iain M. Banks
53) Tapping the Dream Tree - Charles de Lint
53) The Library of Greek Mythology - Apollodorus
54) The Stolen Child - Keith Donohue
55) The House on the Borderland - William Hope Hodgson
56) The Ghost Pirates - William Hope Hodgson
57) 9tail Fox - Jon Courtenay Grimwood
58) Look to Windward - Iain M. Banks
59) The Night Land - William Hope Hodgson
60) Roofworld - Christopher Fowler
61) Not Before Time - John Brunner
62) The View from the Stars - Walter M. Miller
63) My Dirty Little Book of Stolen Time - Liz Jensen
64) The Mamur Zapt and the Night of the Dog - Michael Pearce
65) Looking for Jake and Other Stories - China Mieville
66) City of Baraboo - Barry B. Longyear
67) The Iron Wolf and Other Stories - Richard Adams
68) Eyrbyggja Saga
69) A Patchwork Planet - Anne Tyler
70) The Lost Salt Gift of Blood - Alistair MacLeod
71) Dark Universe - Daniel F. Galouye
72) Three Cups of Tea - Greg Mortenson
73) Soho Black - Christopher Fowler
74) The Restraint of Beasts - Magnus Mills
75) War With the Newts - Karel Capek
76) Little Fuzzy - H. Beam Piper
77) Fuzzy Sapiens - H. Beam Piper
78) Forever Odd - Dean Koontz
79) Brother Odd - Dean Koontz
80) The Buddha of Suburbia - Hanif Kureishi
81) Nightingale Wood - Stella Gibbons
82) Tipping The Velvet - Sarah Waters
83) The Long Road Turns to Joy: A Guide to Walking Meditation - Thich Nhat Hanh
84) The Dark Volume - G.W. Dahlquist
85) Nightingale's Lament - Simon R. Green
86) Hex and the City - Simon R. Green
87) Shockwave Rider - John Brunner
88) The Miracle at Speedy Motors - Alexander McCall Smith
89) The Chymical Wedding - Lindsay Clarke
90) Faeries - ed. Isaac Asimov, Martin Greenberg & Charles G. Waugh
91) The Art of Happiness - HH The Dalai Llama & Howard C. Cutler
92) Orkneyinga Saga - Anon
93) Grotesque - Natsuo Kirino
94) Newton's Wake - Ken MacLeod
95) After Dark - Haruki Murakami
96) Foundation's Edge - Isaac Asimov
97) Foundation and Earth - Isaac Asimov
98) Memoirs of a British Agent - R.H. Bruce Lockhart
99) The Keeping of Christmas at Bracebridge Hall - Washington Irving
100) Darkly Dreaming Dexter - Jeff Lindsay
101) Dearly Devoted Dexter - Jeff Lindsay

Cinema Trips: November & December

November Cinema Trips

The Fourth Kind was not exciting enough, and the fake docudrama aspect of it meant that it dragged and I got a bit bored. Yawn.

I only went to the cinema once in November, and "The Fourth Kind" isn't worthy of being named as my favourite.

December cinema trips

The Descent: Part 2. Apparently the original film had two different endings. The American ending has Sarah escaping from the cave and driving away towards safety, and seeing Juno's ghost in the car with her. The original ending (the one I saw) implies that the scene in the car was just a dream, and ends with Sarah huddled on a ledge in the cave, with no way of escape. The new film starts with a blood-covered Sarah accosting a motorist on a forest road and there is no sign of her car, so maybe it fits with the
original ending better and Sarah did manage to follow the flow of water out of the cave as she says later in the film. Conveniently for the purposes of the plot, Sarah has lost her memory, so the sheriff, deputy and cave rescue
team who accompany her back into the caves to look for her friends have no idea what they will be up against. It is very gruesome in parts, and is basically just like the first film, except for having both men and women fighting the cave-dwellers, rather than just women.

Nativity! is an extremely funny film about rivalry between two schoolteachers and former friends who are putting on nativity plays. Lots of laughing out loud from the audience at the showing I went to. And it's a 'U' so this is one Brit-com that is totally suitable for little kids.

The Queen of Spades. For some reason Broadway was showing this black and white melodrama made in 1949. It is the story of an inpecunious Russian officer who wants to find the secret of winning at cards even if it means selling his soul to do so. Anton Walbrook chews the furniture as the crazed soldier, and there were quite a few (unintentional) laughs!

St Trinian’s 2: The Legend of Fritton’s Gold was very funny, as the girls try to track down the treasure hidden by a pirate ancestor of the headmistress, and foil the woman-hating secret society run by the descendant of the man it was stolen from, who are also after it. I liked the way they created a Flash Mob in a London railway station to distract the baddies.

My favourite film in December was "Nativity!".