Just got told the decade ends this year.

I love "lists of the decade" type stuff and saw this so decided to search a few other book ones. Not quite ready to add comments but will indicate how many I've read. Bear in mind I average two books in a good week.

The Australian

1. The Road, Cormac McCarthy

2. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi

3. Dreams From My Father, Barack Obama

4. Masterworks of the Classical Haida Mythtellers, translated by Robert Bringhurst

5. Suite Francaise, Irene Nemirovsky.

6. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell

7. The Life of Pi, Yann Martel

8. Payback: Debt andd the Shadow Side of Wealth, Margaret Atwood

9. Atonement, Ian McEwan

10. The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown

Read one.

Readers website, popular vote.

The Time Traveler's Wife

by Audrey Niffenegger

2 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

by J.K. Rowling,

3 The Kite Runner

by Khaled Hosseini

4 Twilight

by Stephenie Meyer 5

A Thousand Splendid Suns

by Khaled Hosseini

6 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

by J.K. Rowling,

7 Water for Elephants

by Sara Gruen

8 Middlesex

by Jeffrey Eugenides

9 The Secret Life of Bees

by Sue Monk Kidd

10 Life of Pi

by Yann Martel

Read two.

Some tosser's website.

1. Michael Chabon: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

2. Dave Eggers: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

3. Cormac McCarthy: The Road

4. Marilynne Robinson: Gilead

5. Jeffrey Eugenides: Middlesex

6. Markus Zusak: The Book Thief

7. Craig Thompson: Blankets

8. Joan Didion: The Year of Magical Thinking

9. Jonathan Safran Foer: Everything Is Illuminated

0. David Foster Wallace: Consider The Lobster And Other Essays

None....

Top 10 best-selling books of the decade: Amazon

1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - JK Rowling

2. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - JK Rowling

3. Breaking Dawn - Stephenie Meyer

4. Twilight -Stephenie Meyer

5. Eclipse - Stephenie Meyer

6. The Tales of Beedle the Bard - JK Rowling

7. New Moon - Stephenie Meyer

8. The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger

9. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini

10. A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini

Two, jeez, I gotta get out and start reading some new stuff.

Harry Potter?

The Kite Runner was a good book.

The Satanic Gases: Clearing the Air about Global Warming by Patrick J. Michaels

Clearly an oversight that this was omitted

I've read only one on the entire list The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown, but then who gets time to read when you're a TV mod

only read 2 from the entire list

and reading Obama's book...my verdict so far is: good writer, but it amazes me that someone who seems so negative somehow managed to get to where he is today......

I've read most of the Harry Potter books. I used to buy them for my great-niece who's an addict and read them before I gave them to her.

Ditto the movies.

99% of what I read is non-fiction or fiction based mostly on fact. One of my books of the decade is the recently published Tokyo Vice.

I usually read non-fiction when I want to find something out.

Exceptions would be books by people like Bill Bryson who are entertaining as well as informative.

1421 by Gavin Menzies (Capt. RN, retired).

Explains it was the Chinese who sailed around the world and discovered, mapped and created settlements almost all over the world mostly hundreds of years before the Europeans credited by modern historians.

Columbus did not discover America, nor did Cook discover Australia. Chinese settled in these places as well as the continents of South America and Africa long before Europeans. Confucius apparently documented an eclipse observed in Australia. There were kangaroos in the Imperial zoo when the Forbidden City was inaugurated in the Ming dynasty. Plenty of other evidence including DNA in so called "native" Americans.

More like the book of the century considering the historical implications.

Yes, my brother in law loaned me his copy. Some very interesting stuff.

Wasn't popular with the history establishment though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1421_Hypothesis

Nothing is popular with the academics when it questions their long held beliefs. Wouldn't be the first time an interested amateur has upset the establishment. It is, after all, a hypothesis, and a plausible hypothesis at that. The establishment, in selectively rejecting some of Menzies' conclusions, would be better off addressing the central question Menzies poses: how was it that charts credited to European mapmakers and acknowledged by the establishment as authentic showed accurate details of lands acknowledged as not known to Europeans at the time the maps were made. Menzies simply asks who could have provided the detail if not the Chinese. No answer from the academics so far.

I guess "Jack and Jill" doesn't qualify.

I guess "Jack and Jill" doesn't qualify.

No, neither does "Fly Tying For Dummies".

Quite partial to " The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" trilogy myself. Sad the chap pegged it.

Nothing is popular with the academics when it questions their long held beliefs. Wouldn't be the first time an interested amateur has upset the establishment. It is, after all, a hypothesis, and a plausible hypothesis at that. The establishment, in selectively rejecting some of Menzies' conclusions, would be better off addressing the central question Menzies poses: how was it that charts credited to European mapmakers and acknowledged by the establishment as authentic showed accurate details of lands acknowledged as not known to Europeans at the time the maps were made. Menzies simply asks who could have provided the detail if not the Chinese. No answer from the academics so far.

Last time I was in Oz I went with my brother to Canberra to go to the Museaum Of Australia. They had an exhibition on of the history of written language (or some such; I forget exactly). The Guttenburg Bible was on loan there, for example. Amongst the exhibits was a map from the era of Admiral Zheng He. It clearly shows that he had almost completely circumnavigated Australia and had even visited NZ shores....in 142?.

Dirk Hartog and Willem Janszoon didn't get there for another 200 years or so....and Cook a further 150 years odd after that.

I read Cormac McCarthy's The Road and was disappointed as his No Country for Old Men was adapted by the Coen brothers for their hugely successful film which I haven't seen...I left it for others to read at the compound library in Jeddah when I left as I couldn't recommend it to nobody...

So did you read NCFOM Toots?

The movie was great and i wouldn't mind looking out for the book if you reckon it's worth it.

So did you read NCFOM Toots?

The movie was great and i wouldn't mind looking out for the book if you reckon it's worth it.

nope, haven't seen it in no bookstores neither otherwise I would've picked it up to compare to The Road...

strange, as usually when the movie is a hit the publishers re-issue to cash in on the current popularity...

Yes, my brother in law loaned me his copy. Some very interesting stuff.

Wasn't popular with the history establishment though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1421_Hypothesis

Nothing is popular with the academics when it questions their long held beliefs. Wouldn't be the first time an interested amateur has upset the establishment. It is, after all, a hypothesis, and a plausible hypothesis at that. The establishment, in selectively rejecting some of Menzies' conclusions, would be better off addressing the central question Menzies poses: how was it that charts credited to European mapmakers and acknowledged by the establishment as authentic showed accurate details of lands acknowledged as not known to Europeans at the time the maps were made. Menzies simply asks who could have provided the detail if not the Chinese. No answer from the academics so far.

I read the Wiki page on the 1421 book and also his follow-up book. The author, Mr Menzies, is a fraud through and through. Reminds me of an author I met who attained a lot of success, years earlier. I can't recall his name or the title of his book, but he had one of the first books that described crop circles and other bogus paranormal phenomena. He and I were staying at the same Mexican hotel, and the attractive young ladies were going ga-ga over him and his stories of esoteric stuff. At one point, when he and I were walking alone, I told him I thought his theories were full of crap.

He got visibly angry, and tried to get me to promise not to tell any of it (the truth) to the girls at the hotel. I was sobered at how seriously intense he suddenly became when he saw that I might bust his bubble, and reveal what a total charlatan he was.

I think this type of literature kicked off with "Chariots of the Gods" by Erich von Dänikenin in 1968.

They are usually enormously successful and make a pot load of money for the writer.

This, of course, tends to p!ss off the more "legitimate" scholar.

Personally I need to find only one factual error in this type of work and it condemns the whole book to the bin.

I think this type of literature kicked off with "Chariots of the Gods" by Erich von Dänikenin in 1968.

They are usually enormously successful and make a pot load of money for the writer.

This, of course, tends to p!ss off the more "legitimate" scholar.

Personally I need to find only one factual error in this type of work and it condemns the whole book to the bin.

The main "factual error" is yours, a decade is 10 years, 'nutha year to go.

There was no year zero.

Quite partial to " The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" trilogy myself. Sad the chap pegged it.

I was gonna mention that too. Just finished the third one.

Stieg Larsson is the chap's name, and he wrote one of the best stories (of its genre) that I've read in a very very long time.

Indeed, very sad the chap kicked the bucket before seeing it published, and the phenomenon it has (and still is) become(ing).

I read way too much and too many different things to ever make a clear list. I have seen this books of the decade list in many places and I am always confused. What is it based on? How well the book sold? How did the book impact a community? What? In the last ten years I have read so many great books that I have have to someone narrow it down to genres or something for me to even suggest something.

No Country for Old Men is worth a read. Although if you didn't like The Road, not sure you'd like that as it's the same style. It's not quite as depressing, actually maybe it is. I couldn't put The Road down, but it left me feeling empty.

No Country for Old Men is worth a read. Although if you didn't like The Road, not sure you'd like that as it's the same style. It's not quite as depressing, actually maybe it is. I couldn't put The Road down, but it left me feeling empty.

I just bought The Road last week and have been waiting to finish another book before I start it. Everyone keeps saying how good a book it is.

I don't read as much as I used to and should make more effort to read more, maybe I should make that my new years resolution.

But I do still have some input:

Dean Koontz: For me he is somewhere between fantasy and horror, and fantasy is my favourite genre. Seize the Night was one that I enjoyed very much.

Dan Brown and David Gibbins: Two very similar writers. The Davinci code was a stunning piece of work and I also thoroughly enjoyed 'the last gospel' by Gibbins. I look forward to reading more of their work but I hope for a bit more action, especially from gibbins

Andy McNab: What is there to say. May never be a classic but it is action, action, action and his books are always 'page turners'. Can't get enough of them really.

But my all time favourite author of the decade is, and by some margin..........

Irvine Welsh:

His characters are just so, so, so strong. You can love them, hate them, detest them, loath them or whatever but you will never forget them. You find yourself reading a chapter and wondering "But what about spud", in the way that you might do when in a pub and a friend isn't there. When reading an Irvine Welsh book you make friends or enemies, whether you like them or not.

Sergeant Bruce Robertson (from the book filth), for example, is a character so filthy, disgusting and utterly deplorable yet Welsh is so good at introducing his players that you feel sorry for the scumbag. And he is a complete tosser but I have not read that book now for about 5 years yet I still remember his name.

More of the same please Irvine, I like your stuff mate.

Yes, my brother in law loaned me his copy. Some very interesting stuff.

Wasn't popular with the history establishment though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1421_Hypothesis

Nothing is popular with the academics when it questions their long held beliefs. Wouldn't be the first time an interested amateur has upset the establishment. It is, after all, a hypothesis, and a plausible hypothesis at that. The establishment, in selectively rejecting some of Menzies' conclusions, would be better off addressing the central question Menzies poses: how was it that charts credited to European mapmakers and acknowledged by the establishment as authentic showed accurate details of lands acknowledged as not known to Europeans at the time the maps were made. Menzies simply asks who could have provided the detail if not the Chinese. No answer from the academics so far.

I read the Wiki page on the 1421 book and also his follow-up book. The author, Mr Menzies, is a fraud through and through. Reminds me of an author I met who attained a lot of success, years earlier. I can't recall his name or the title of his book, but he had one of the first books that described crop circles and other bogus paranormal phenomena. He and I were staying at the same Mexican hotel, and the attractive young ladies were going ga-ga over him and his stories of esoteric stuff. At one point, when he and I were walking alone, I told him I thought his theories were full of crap.

He got visibly angry, and tried to get me to promise not to tell any of it (the truth) to the girls at the hotel. I was sobered at how seriously intense he suddenly became when he saw that I might bust his bubble, and reveal what a total charlatan he was.

Yes, many real historians have already debunked Menzies. Many of them Chinese as well. One would think that they would like Menzies's verison of their part in history but they were some of the first vocies against his ideas. Since then the history community as waded through all his points and put him to rest. That is the difference between real historical work and popular history, because enough people outside the academic community liked his ideas enough he was able to publish another book. Such a shame.

Just for the record I thought The Da Vinci Code was trash.

And on the subject of Menzies and 1421 I haven't seen any comments from trained navigators disagreeing with him. Academics didn't believe it was possible to travel from South America across the Pacific Ocean on a balsa raft either, but that's another story.

Oh, and academics once believed the world was flat, but a navigator proved them wrong.

Just for the record I thought The Da Vinci Code was trash.

And on the subject of Menzies and 1421 I haven't seen any comments from trained navigators disagreeing with him. Academics didn't believe it was possible to travel from South America across the Pacific Ocean on a balsa raft either, but that's another story.

Oh, and academics once believed the world was flat, but a navigator proved them wrong.

Popular history vs real history.

The map I saw in Canberra convinces me about the Chinese.

Also on historical navigation....I was taught that Magellan was the first to circumnavigate the world. Chinese sailors aside....Magellan died in the Phillipines, and it was one of his officers that carried on back to Spain...so it was the officer, not Magellan.

Just for the record I thought The Da Vinci Code was trash.

Many didn't think much of the movie either. It was one of those 'marmite' stories.