The year is now 2003, when President George W. Bush invaded Iraq in a fit of pique, Broadway went dark, the Old Man of the Mountain finally crumbled, President George W. Bush declared the Iraq War a victory, and the great Katharine Hepburn died. And the book-world carried on regardless, hitting these high notes: Best […]

The year is now 2002, when Queen Elizabeth II marked her 50th year on the throne, Washington, DC spent a month being terrorized by a sniper, tornadoes rampaged across America, and Stephen Jay Gould, Elizabeth Longford, Kenneth Koch, and Caroline Knapp all died. Yet somehow, I still felt like reading, and books kept appearing. These […]

We’ve reached 2001, the year of the 9-11 attacks. Books – and everything else – in America were necessarily overshadowed, but there were of course nonetheless works of great worth: Best Fiction: 10 The Penguin Book of Irish Fiction Colm Toibin ed (1999) – It’s this enormous, unendingly rewarding volume that gave me my first […]

We’ve now reached 1999, when the number of humans living on Earth passed six billion, America was shocked to its core by the Columbine shootings, Vladimir Putin came to power, and the indispensable Alan Clark died. But the world of books was alive and well, and here’s how it rated: Best Fiction: 10 The Intuitionist […]

Through toil and patience, we’ve reached 1998, when the IRA once again laid down its arms, Islamic terrorism rises all over the world, President Bill Clinton is impeached for the 431st Clinton scandal, and the great Martha Gellhorn died. Here’s the book-world outlook: Fiction 10 – A Man in Full by Tom Wolfe – What […]

We’re now up to 1997, the year when Woolworth’s, Mother Teresa, Princess Diana, and the great Jacques Cousteau all died. But books were very much alive and well, as our list clearly shows: Best Fiction: 10 – The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald – It took me a while to warm up to the quirky minimalism […]

We’ve now reached 1996, the year Carl Sagan died. The books looked like this: Best Fiction: 10 – The Beauty of Men by Andrew Holleran – This novel about an aging man’s look back on the loves and fucks of his life in the gay demimonde reads every bit as beautifully as Holleran’s consciousness-defining hit […]

We’re now at 1995, the year that the Federal Building in Oklahoma City was bombed, the year that terrorists released nerve gas in a Tokyo subway, the year Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, and the year the great Jeremy Brett died. These were the year’s best books: Best Fiction: 10 – Rule of the Bone by […]

We’ve reached 1994, when genocide stalked Rwanda, the 145th Clinton scandal broke, Richard Nixon was recalled to Hell, and the great Cab Calloway died. The book-world’s top efforts looked like this: Best Fiction: 10 – The Birthday Boys by Beryl Bainbridge – The doomed 1912 Scott expedition to the South Pole is the unlikely subject […]

We’re now at 1993, when the Boston winter was gawd-awful, Jurassic Park stomped into movie theaters, and the great Thurgood Marshall died. Here’s how the book-world looked: Best Fiction: 10 – A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth – This sprawling novel set in 1950s India and featuring four families populated by vivid characters is so […]

We move on to 1992, when Johnny Carson retired, the Clinton era began, something called a “web browser” was first introduced, and the great Wallace Stegner died. Best Fiction: 10 – Black Water by Joyce Carol Oates – I’d never been a big fan of Joyce Carol Oates’s writing, and when I read the advance […]

We continue with the year 1991, when Operation Desert Storm expelled Iraq from Kuwait, Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated, the Soviet Union dissolved at long last, and the great Gene Roddenberry died. This is how the books stacked up: Best Fiction: 10 – Rumpole a la Carte by John Mortimer – Six classic […]

We begin in that halcyon year of 1990, the year of my return to Boston! Thatcher resigned, the Berlin Wall fell, priceless works of art were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and the great Jim Henson died. And in the world of books, this is how things broke down: Best Fiction: 10 – […]