Lionel Shriver, the author of We Need to Talk about Kevin (winner of the 2005 Orange Prize) and most recently, the much-lauded The Post-Birthday World was recently asked to name her top "best book" picks for The Week. As always, the commentary is just as telling as the picks. They are:
- The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton - "I love Wharton's prose style: artful rather than arty, eloquent but never fussy, and always clear. Probably her best, this novel is romantic but not sentimental, and I'm a sucker for unhappy endings."
- Atonement by Ian McEwan -- "This book demonstrates that seemingly small sins can have enormous and permanently dire consequences. He offers his protagonist no option on expiation; sometimes with guilt you just have to live with it."
- English Passengers by Matthew Kneale -- "It's wonderfully wicked about religion, and it's hilarious."
- Paris Trout by Peter Dexter -- "Dexter writes about race and bigotry without the moral obviousness that this subject matter often elicits. His tone is terse and muscular, but not pose-y and tough-guy."
- As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann -- Intensely erotic but never sordid or even very (if you will) blow-by-blow. Since McCann is a straight woman, her novel isn't tainted by the faint self-justification of many gay author's work."
- Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates -- "I don't think anyone's life is simple or easy, however materially comfortable it may be, and Yates was depressive enough to appreciate this fact."
I don't know about you, but Shriver's comments on these novels makes me ever-so-curious about her -- seems to have a tough streak, which intrigues me. Will need to pick up The Post-Birthday World poste haste.
