Listmania!
My Top 10 Books of the Last Six Months
Murphy (Calder modern classics)Murphy (Calder modern classics) by Samuel Beckett
Buy used from: £2.99
Probably the best place to start with Beckett. Still very Joycean, but shows the promise of Beckett's own thought and style.
Crash (Vintage Blue)Crash (Vintage Blue) by J.G. Ballard
Buy used from: £1.00
One of my favorite contemporary British writers, this is a classic post-modern statement.
Flaubert's Parrot (Picador Books)Flaubert's Parrot (Picador Books) by Julian Barnes
Buy used from: £0.01
Hilarious meta-biography.
Life: A User's ManualLife: A User's Manual by Georges Perec
Buy new: £6.73 / Used from: £4.50
Perec managed to write one of the best books of ther twentieth century, and despite being dead, is still not recognised. This book spans the inhabitants of a Parisian apartment block over sixty years
White Noise (Picador Books)White Noise (Picador Books) by Don DeLillo
Buy new: £4.76 / Used from: £1.68
Fantastic modern American writer, pastly responsible for Brett Easton Ellis and Chuck Pahlunik.
The Giro PlayboyThe Giro Playboy by Michael Smith
Buy new: £6.99 / Used from: £0.01
Smith's first published work from this year. Imagine those dry American beat novels mixed with more drugs, and less 'englightening' drug experiences, depressing, and hopeful too. A light read.
Omnibus: Albert Angelo, House Mother Normal & Trawl (3 titles)Omnibus: Albert Angelo, House Mother Normal & Trawl (3 titles) by B.S. Johnson
Buy new: £11.99 / Used from: £36.81
Particularly the first book of the three 'Albert Angelo', Johnson's aim was to innovate within the framework of the novel, and is scathingly funny.
FictionsFictions by Jorge Borges
Buy new: £5.47 / Used from: £2.77
Legendary South American short-story writer, Borges creates entire epics in ten page stories. An anti-modernist, he somewhat ironically pre-empted post-modern literature.
The Crying of Lot 49The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
Buy new: £5.27 / Used from: £2.20
Somewhat iconic American reclouse, this is a good book to start getting into Pynchon whose playful narratives and language can be disorientating. Like a stoned Joseph Heller.
Beckett Trilogy: "Molloy", "Malone Dies", "The Unnamable"Beckett Trilogy: "Molloy", "Malone Dies", "The Unnamable" by Samuel Beckett
Buy used from: £58.17
Stunning, depressing, painful, violently comic...fantastic.