Sunday, May 21, 2006

Best Fiction lists

Did the New York Times Best Fiction of the Last 25 Years list leave you underwhelmed/ disgruntled/ aggrieved/ in harmony with the universe? Beth of Book of the Day is taking nominations from book bloggers until the end of May for an alternative list.

Meanwhile at Readerville, the voting is complete.

"Readerville Survey: The best Work of American Fiction from 1980 to 2005

"The winner, with four votes: Gilead -- Marilynne Robinson (2004)

"Runners up, with three votes:
Housekeeping -- Marilynne Robinson (1980)
Love Medicine -- Louise Erdrich (1984)

"Runners up, with two votes:
Little, Big -- John Crowley (1981)
Blood Meridian -- Cormac McCarthy (1985)
Empire Falls -- Richard Russo (2001)
Beloved -- Toni Morrison (1987)
A Thousand Acres -- Jane Smiley (1991)
Mason & Dixon -- Thomas Pynchon (1997)

"Honorable mentions, one vote each, listed by year:

1980
The Transit of Venus -- Shirley Hazzard
1981
Sixty Stories -- Donald Barthelme
1982
The Color Purple -- Alice Walker
Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant -- Anne Tyler
1983
Winter's Tale -- Mark Helprin
1984
Lincoln -- Gore Vidal
1985
Lonesome Dove -- Larry McMurtry
1986
Golden Days -- Carolyn See
The Prince of Tides -- Pat Conroy
1987
Rock Springs -- Richard Ford
Gone to Soldiers -- Marge Piercy
1988
Where I'm Calling From -- Raymond Carver
1990
L.A. Confidential -- James Ellroy
The Things They Carried -- Tim O'Brien
The Gold Coast -- Nelson Demille
1991
The Gold-Bug Variations -- Richard Powers
1992
All The Pretty Horses -- Cormac McCarthy
Lost in the City -- Edward P. Jones
1993
Einstein's Dreams -- Alan Lightman
Cryptonomicon -- Neal Stephenson
The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven -- Sherman Alexie
1994
What I Lived For -- Joyce Carol Oates
1996
Martin Dressler -- Steven Millhauser
1997
American Pastoral -- Philip Roth
1998
The Hours -- Michael Cunningham
The Intuitionist -- Colson Whitehead
1999
Close Range -- Annie Proulx
2000
Gertrude and Claudius -- John Updike
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay -- Michael Chabon
Lying Awake -- Mark Salzman
The Last Samurai -- Helen DeWitt
2001
Bel Canto -- Ann Patchett
The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse -- Louise Erdrich
Demonology -- Rick Moody
The Evidence Against Her -- Robb Forman Dew
2002
Miniatures -- Norah Labiner
The Time of Our Singing -- Richard Powers
2003
The Kite Runner -- Khaled Hosseini
Sleep Toward Heaven -- Amanda Ward
The Known World -- Edward Jones
Pattern Recognition -- William Gibson"

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