Marc's Reads of 2012

Hello all. In this most recent post, I wanted to list the books I read throughout 2012. While I attempted to fulfill my personal "50 Book Pledge," I sadly still came up woefully short at just twenty-four - an improvement over 2011's seventeen, but I still could have picked up the pace a bit with my reading habits. Still, the past year in books was a very enjoyable one for me, as I kept hitting one satisfying volume after the next (I love it when you hit a chain of good reads like that) - overall, a fantastic selection of talented authors and compelling subjects.

Since so many of my reading experiences this year were positive ones, I thought I'd present them here not in any ordered list, but instead in special categories that both compliment the books themselves and illuminate some of the thematic and stylistic similarities certain books shared with each other.

So, without further ado...


Peering Across History and Lifetimes
· The Bad Girl by Mario Vargas Llosa
· Fire in the Blood by Irène Némirovsky
· Touch by Alexi Zentner
· The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

Worthwhile Rereads
· A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
· A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

The Film Books
· Zona: A Book About a Film About a Journey to a Room by Geoff Dyer
· Robert Bresson (Revised) edited by James Quandt
· Olivier Assayas edited by Kent Jones

*For a more detailed write-up on these film books, head over to my guest post at Toronto Film Review.

Most Disappointing Film Book
· Jean Renoir: Projections of Paradise by Ronald Bergan

Japanese Literature
· Spring Snow by Yukio Mishima
· 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (read my capsule review at bookshelf.ca)

Existential Literature
· Point Omega by Don DeLillo

Wanderlust
· The Art of Travel by Alain de Botton
· The Global Soul: Jet Lag, Shopping Malls, and the Search for Home by Pico Iyer

D.H. Lawrence 101
· Out of Sheer Rage by Geoff Dyer
· Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence

Literary Paris
· The Emperor of Paris by C.S. Richardson
· The Belly of Paris by Emile Zola

Ecstatic Wordcraft
· Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem
· Lisey's Story by Stephen King
· Telegraph Avenue by Michael Chabon (read my capsule review at bookshelf.ca)

Most Life-Affirming
· Looking for Alaska by John Green
· The Fault in Our Stars by John Green