Category Archives: Writing

I first kept this list on my webpage, but then figured that it would be easier to edit (and access) on my blog. So, I started this list on 7 July 2008 (my 39th birthday), and try to keep it up to date when I can, more for me than anyone else!

I’ve kept an informal list of books I’ve read in the last few years though I’ve missed recording a number. I sometimes get this feeling I don’t read enough – but then realise that I actually read a lot, especially on planes and in hotel rooms, with all the work travel I was doing. Now, with less travel, I’m making more of an effort to make time for reading when I’m not on a plane!

• Milan Kundera’s Unbearable Lightness of Being (and others)
• Alice Munro’s Short Story collections
  
• Lorrie Moore’s Birds of America
• Edmund White’s Boy’s Own Story (and others)
• Favourite poets (of which I’ve usually read a few of their books): Margaret Atwood (Selected Poems 2 is excellent), Mark Doty, Sharon Olds, Patrick Lane, Pablo Neruda.
• Anne-Marie MacDonald’s Fall On Your Knees
• Wole Soyinka’s Season of Anomy
• Salman Rushdie’s novels (particularly Midnight’s Children, Satanic Verses)
• Paul Monette’s Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story
• James Merrill’s Changing Light at Sandover

2013

• Jonathan Franzen’s Strong Motion (Fiction) – See review on this website
  

2012

• Michael Ondaatje’s The Cat’s Table (Fiction) – My god, did I love this. What a great start to the year for reading.
• Tara Moss’s Split (Crime/Thriller)
  
• David Musgrave’s Phantom Limb (Poetry)
• Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible (Fiction)
• Andy Kissane’s Out to Lunch (Poetry)
• Bernhard Schlink’s The Reader (Fiction)
• Assaracus, A Journal of Gay Poetry, Issue 6 (Poetry) – Normally I don’t list journals and magazines, but it was a good read and I was honoured to have my poems included in it.
• Joyce Carol Oates’ I’ll Take You There (Fiction) – Always wondered what her writing was like. I enjoyed it enough, not spectacularly. The story was contained and I didn’t fall into it. But she’s a good writer.
• Alex Miller’s Lovesong (Fiction) – One of Australia’s more prominent writers – I enjoyed this, a good story, readable, engaging. Something fairly direct about his style. It was an interesting contrast to the Oates book.
• Armistaud Maupin’s Mary Ann in Autumn (Fiction) – A return to the Tales of the City series that I loved so much. This was a pretty good return to form as I didn’t love ‘Michael Tolliver Lives’.
  
• Nicole Mones’ a cup of light (Fiction) – an interesting enough exploration of the world of Chinese porcelain. Well-told.
  
• Shane Koyczan’s Our Deathbeds Will Be Thirsty (Poetry)
• Jennifer Egan’s Emerald City (Short Fiction)
• Bonny Cassidy’s Certain Fathoms (Poetry)
• Benjamin Law’s Gaysia (Non-fiction)
• Leigh Stein’s Dispatch from the Future (Poetry)
• Karen Russell’s Swamplandia! (Fiction)
• Kate Fagan’s First Light (Poetry)
• Ruth Park’s Harp in the South (Fiction)
• Toby Fitch’s Rawshock (Poetry)
• David Adams Richards’s Mercy Among The Children (Fiction)
• Ahn Do’s The Happiest Refuge (Memoir)

2011

• Mary Oliver’s New and Selected Poems Volume 2 (Poetry) – some gems, and better in small doses, I was surprised that I wasn’t taken by the work of this celebrated poet.
• John Rock’s Paseando: Out for a walk (Autobiography) – an interesting and engaging book by a friend – travel tales and more
• Richard Labonte’s Beautiful Boys (Gay Erotica/Anthology) – I thought this was a good, digestable mix of stories – some more traditional erotica, others less so.
• Michael Cunningham’s By Nightfall (Fiction) – I’ve read everything that he’s written and I’m not stopping now. Many moments of beauty, but I wasn’t as engaged as previous books.
• Larissa Lai’s Automaton Biographies (Poetry)
• Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet (Fiction) – This is Australia, it’s language, it’s heart and bones. They should have made me read this when I landed in Sydney.
  
• Carol Shields’s The Stone Diaries (Fiction) 
• Adam Gopnik’s Paris to the Moon (Memoir)
• Alice Munro’s Too Much Happiness (Short Fiction)
• Charles Merewether’s Ai Weiwei: Under Construction (Art Criticism/Review)
• Best American Poetry 2011 (Poetry)
• Dave Eggers’s Short Short Fiction (Fiction)
• Tim Miller’s Shirts & Skin (Autobiography/Gay)
• Joanne Harris’s Coastliners (Fiction)
• Tina Fey’s Bossypants (Autobiography/Comedy)
• Patrick Gale’s Rough Music (Fiction)
• E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web (Fiction/Children’s)
• Jennifer Egan’s Welcome to the Goon Squad (Fiction) – my pick for the year. Great writing, great story-telling, of-the-moment, funny, touching. The whole gamut. Loved it.
  
• Alan Downs’s The Velvet Rage (Psychology)
• Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (Fiction) – As a first foray into trying to read a book on an iphone, this was a good choice – with a linear narrative. Always wondered what the fuss was about, and now I know: really beautiful use of language. Jane is a pretty fabulous character too, though I think I really understood her after seeing this year’s film version (which was great).
  
• Margaret Atwood’s Year of the Flood (Fiction) – I love that Atwood did a companion novel set at the same time as Oryx and Crake but from a completely different perspective. Inventive, readable, poetic and engaging. That’s how I like ‘em.
• Dan Disney’s and then when the (Poetry)
• Chandler Burr’s The Emperor of Scent (Biography/Science) – Review on my blog.
  
• Michael Chabon’s Gentlemen of the Road (Fiction) – Review on my blog.
  
• Ian McEwan’s Company of Strangers (Fiction)
• Anita Desai’s The Zigzag Way (Fiction)
• Anne Tyler’s Back When We Were Grownups (Fiction) – I traded in a stack of books at Elizabeth’s used book store, and used them to buy the Burr, Chabon, McEwan, Desai and Tyler… I’d say the Burr was the most engaging! What next, what next?
• Gail Anderson-Dargatz’s A Recipe for Bees (Fiction) – a Canadian novelist who had a hit with her first book. I found this engaging and quite lovely – and enjoyed the older narrator. I’m a bit tired of the trope of the curmudgeonly, cute and cuddly older narrator (i.e. I did love the story of Water for Elephants, but found the narrator a bit much) and found this speaker much richer and more interesting.
  
• Dr. Raymond Moody’s Glimpses of Eternity (Spirituality) – a follow-on to his book about near-death experiences, this one is about shared-death experiences. I’m open to what he presents though didn’t love the way he presented it.
• Michael Ondaatje’s The Cat’s Table (Fiction) – I finished the first half in the last days of 2011…
  

2009

• Anne Enright’s The Gathering (Fiction) – Booker winner, and she went to my international college, many moons ago. I can see why people had trouble with it – as I see it hasn’t gotten universally great reviews. There’s something unsentimental and hard about it, but it’s also an amazing book.
• Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Fiction) – Now this is the type of book that readers like – engaging, original, accessible. Both gritty and sweet. I can see why it was a best-seller, and enjoyed it myself.
  
• Reading Six Feet Under – TV to Die For (Cultural Studies) – not for everyone, academic analyses of different themes in the TV show, but it allowed me, with pleasure, to revisit the best TV show ever.
  
• Alice Sebold’s The Almost Moon (Fiction) – it didn’t grab me, or was this just because The Lovely Bones was so unforgettably good.
  
• Dorothy Porter’s The Bee Hut (Poetry) – a beautiful short collection, published posthumously and including some of the last poems of this very original voice.
  
• Norman Doidge’s The Brain That Changes Itself (Science) – thought about this for weeks, talked about it with friends for weeks. Still affecting the way I view the world.
  
• Lorrie Moore’s Collected Stories (Short Fiction)
• Tara Moss’ Fetish (Crime/Thriller)
• Robert Bly’s translation of Rumi, The Kabir Book (Poetry).
  
• Haruki Murukami’s Dance Dance Dance (Fiction) – Wow, does this man have an interesting mind. Really enjoyed it.
  
• Henry James’ The Aspern Papers (Fiction) - since I was passing through Venice, I took a friend’s recommendation to read this slim book set in Venice. Now I can say I’ve read some Henry James…
• Tim Winton’s Breath (Fiction) - A lot packed into this short novel.
• Second Person Queer (Essays) – Finally read this anthology that I was included in. A few great pieces, not sure whether the idea works as a whole book.
• James Robert Baker’s Adrenalin (Fiction) – Phew. A wild ride, read on the high recommendations of friends who are huge fans of his. A piece of gay history.
  
• David Ebershoff’s the 19th wife (Fiction) - Interesting topic. Didn’t like it as much as the Danish Girl.
• Tim Winton’s Dirt Music (Fiction) – God I loved this book. Great introduction for me to a premier Australian writer.
• Dashiell Hammett’s The Maltese Falcon (Crime) – read for a literary salon which I eventually couldn’t make it too. Darn. Could see it was the model for much of what followed – but didn’t love it.
• Dorothy Porter’s Monkey’s Mask (Poetry/Crime) – also (re)read this for the salon. Amazing book. Quick read!
• Michael Ondaatje’s In The Skin of The Lion (Fiction) – I read this aloud to my partner – an interesting experiment. When are they going to make a movie of this?
• Kate Atkinson’s When Will There Be Good News? (Crime Fiction) – A nice surprise, as I loved her first novel, to see she’s turned to crime… and with a great story and characters. sweartogod.
• Anne Enright’s Yesterday’s Weather (Short Fiction) – Enjoyed them. Now curious to read her Booker Prize winning novel.
  
• Edmund White’s Hotel de Dream (Fiction)
• Tom Cho’s Look Who’s Morphing (Short Fiction)
  
• Ken Wilber’s Grace and Grit (Philosophy/Biography) – I’m loving this book as I read it and it’s changing the way I think about spirituality, enlightenment, disease and the new age movement.
• Levitt and Dubner’s Freakonomics (Culture/Non-Fiction). A great read. Fun and insightful and challenging.
  
• Alice Munro’s Lives of Girls and Women (Fiction). I’m a huge fan of Alice Munro – and it was interesting to read one of her early books.
• Best American Poetry 2008 (Poetry) – My pal John introduced me to this series years ago. I really like this year’s collection. Some stunning work.
• Salman Rushdie’s The Enchantress of Florence (Fiction) – completely adored this.
  
• Best Gay Poetry 2008 (Poetry) – some amazing work in here
• The Kite Runner (Fiction) - Good story but I didn’t love the writing itself. Maybe I expected too much because of the hype.
  

2008

• Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief (Fiction)
• Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants (Fiction)
• Sean Horlor’s Made Beautiful By Use (Poetry)
• Lorna Crozier’s Whetstone (Poetry) Stunning.
• Sharon Olds’ Blood, Tin, Straw (Poetry)
• Miranda July’s No One Belongs Here More Than You (Short Fiction)
• Alex Boyd’s Making Bones Walk (Poetry)
• Fiona Tinwei Lam’s Intimate Distances (Poetry)
• Anne-Marie MacDonald’s Fall On Your Knees (Fiction) – Reread it to see if I still liked it as much. I did.
  
• Margaret Atwood’s Moral Disorder (Short Fiction)
• Jes Battis’ Night Child (Fantasy)
  
• Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (Fiction)
• Elizabeth Bishop’s Eat Pray Love (Memoir)
• Alain de Botton’s Essays on Love (Fiction)
• Sarah McDonald’s Holy Cow (Memoir)
• Keirsey’s Please Understand Me II (Personality Test)
• Nam Le’s The Boat (Short Fiction)
• Brian Rigg’s A False Paradise (Poetry)
• Augusten Buroughs’ A Wolf at the Table (Memoir)
• Sarah McDonald’s Holy Cow (Memoir/Travel)
  
• Candace Bushell’s Sex and the City (Fiction/Journalism)
• Martin Harrison’s Wild Bees (Poetry)
• Alan Weiss’ Getting Started in Consulting (Business)
• John Gould’s Kilter (Short Short Fiction)
• A.M.Homes’ Things You Should Know (Short Fiction)
• Eduardo Galeano’s Memory of Fire (History/Fiction)
• Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist (Fiction)
• Raimond Gaita’s Romulus, My Father (Biography) - Loved this book as a portrayal of immigrant Australia. Great characters, great storytelling.
  
• David Marr’s The Henson Case (Non-Fiction) – A clear, lucid account of the Bill Henson controversy
• Kevin Hart’s Flame Tree: Selected Poems (Poetry)
• Colin Carberry’s Ceasefire in Purgatory (Poetry)
• Michael Ondaatje’s Divisadero (Fiction) – Great finish to the year. What a beautiful book.
  

2007

• Alain De Botton’s The Art of Travel (Philosophy)
• Henri von Doussa’s The Park Bench (Fiction)
• Jonathan Lethem’s Men and Cartoons (Short Fiction)
• David Mitchell’s Ghostwritten (Fiction)
• Linda Gregg’s Flesh and Things (Poetry)
• Billy Collin’s Sailing Alone Around The Room: New and Selected Poems
• Best American Poetry 2006
• Jerry and Esther Hicks’ Ask and It Is Given (New Age/Philosophy)
• Rattawut Lapcharoensap’s Sightseeing (Short Fiction)
• Steven King’s On Writing (Non-Fiction)
• Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake (Fiction)
• Alexander McCall Smith’s The No. Ladies’ Detective Agency (Fiction)
• Truman Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s (Fiction)
• Jean-Dominique Bauby’s The Diving-Bell & The Butterfly (Memoir)
• Anonymous’s The Bride Stripped Bare (Fiction)
• Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Law Vegas (Nonfiction/Journalism)
• David Allen’s How to Get Things Done (Career/Self-Help)
• Gangaji’s Diamond in Your Pocket (Spirituality)
• Seminal: The Anthology of Canada’s Gay Male Poets (Poetry)
• Patrick Lane’s What the Stones Remember (Memoir)
• Eckhardt Tolle’s A New Earth (Philosophy)
• Ben Elton’s High Society (Fiction)
• Suzanne Chick’s Searching for Charmiane (Biography)
• Tracy Quan’s Diary of a Married Call Girl (Fiction)
• Alice Munro’s The View From Castle Rock (Memoir)
• Margaret Atwood’s Moral Disorder (Short Fiction/Memoir)
• Alice Niffenegger’s The Time Traveller’s Wife (Fiction)
• Pablo Neruda’s Isla Negra (Poetry)
• Milan Kundera’s Farewell Waltz (Fiction)
• Salman Rushdie’s Grimus (Fiction)
  

2006

• Mark Doty’s The Source (Poetry)
• Mark Doty’s School of the Arts (Poetry)
• Ken Wilber’s No Borders (Philosophy)
• Stephen Greco’s The Sperm Engine (Erotica/Memoir)
• Alice Munro’s Runaway (Short Fiction)
• Sean Condon’s My ‘Dam Life (memoir/humour)
• Daniel Gawthrop’s The Rice Queen Diaries (memoir)
• Yann Martel’s The Life of Pi (Fiction)
• Joanne Harris’ Chocolat (Fiction)
• Edmund White’s My Lives (Autobiography)
• Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (Fiction)
• Michael V. Smith’s What You Can’t Have (Poetry)
• George Ilsley’s ManBug (Fiction)
• Edmund White’s My Lives (Autobiography)
• Eckhardt Tolle’s The Power Of Now (Philosophy)
• Shauna Singh Baldwin’s What the Body Remembers (Fiction)
• Shalini Akhil’s The Bollywood Beauty (Fiction)
• John Murray’s A Few Short Notes on Tropical Butterflies (Short Fiction)
• Lorna Crozier’s What the Living Won’t Let Go (Poetry)

2005

• Jonathan Franzen’s The Twenty-Seventh City (Novel)
• Gerald Stern’s Last Blue (Poetry)
• Alain De Botton’s Status Anxiety (Non-Fiction)
• Michel Houellebecq’s Lanzerote (Fiction)
• Noel Rowe’s Next to Nothing (Poetry)
• Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line Of Beauty (Novel)
• Dorothy Porter’s The Monkey’s Mask (Poetry)
• Lynne Truss’ Eats, Shoots and Leaves (Non-Fiction)
• Gerald Stern’s This Time (Poetry)
• Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink (Non-Fiction)
• Jill Jones’ Screen Jets Heaven (Poetry)
• Marshall Moore’s Black Shapes in a Darkened Room (Short Fiction)
• Sandra Alland’s A Shape of a Tongue (Poetry)
• Victoria Finlay’s Colour: Travels through the Paintbox (Non-Fiction)
• Michael Cunningham’s Land’s End (Non-Fiction)
• Gerald Stern’s Lucky Life (Poetry)
• Steve Kluger’s Almost Like Being in Love (Novel)
• Tony Hoagland’s Donkey Gospel (Poetry)
• Greg Wharton’s Johny Was and Other Tall Tales (Erotica)
• Kevin Bentley’s Let’s Shut Out the World (Memoir)
• Randall Mann’s Complaint in the Garden (Poetry)
• Jameson Currier’s Desire, Lust, Passion, Sex (Short Fiction/Erotica)
• Ann Hood’s An Orthinologist’s Guide to Life (Short Fiction)
• Kevin Bentley’s Wild Animals I Have Known (Memoir)

2004

• Best Gay Erotica 2004 (Erotica)
• Mark Doty’s Still Life with Oranges and Lemons (Non-Fiction)
• Peter Carey’s Oscar and Lucinda (Novel)
• Gerald Stern’s American Sonnets (Poetry)
• Peter Minter’s Empty Texas (Poetry)
• The Complete Guide to Spirits and Liqueurs (Non-Fiction)
• Best Gay Asian Erotica (Erotica)
• David Sedaris’ Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim (Humour)
• Ian Phillips and Greg Whartons’ Law of Desire (Erotica/Anthology)
• Meanjin’s Australasian Issue (Review/Anthology)
• Gerry Turcotte’s Winterlude (Poetry)
• Philip Hammiel’s In the Year of our Lord’s Slaughter (Poetry)
• Marshall Moore’s Ideal for Living (Novel)
• Wayson Choy’s All That Matters (Novel)
• Jeffrey Eugenides’ Middlesex (Novel)
• George Ilsley’s Random Acts of Hatred (Short Fiction)
• Anne-Marie MacDonald’s The Way the Crow Flies (Novel)

Around 2003

• Best Gay Erotica 2003 (Erotica)
• Tracey Quan’s Diary of a Manhattan Call Girl (Novel)
• Jim Gladwell’s The Tipping Point (Non-Fiction)
• Joel Tan’s Monster (Poetry)
• Sharon Olds’ The Unswept Room (Poetry)
• Laurie Moore’s Self-Help (Short Fiction)
• Luke Davies’ Running with Light
• Carol Shield’s Unless (Novel)
• Kevin Bentley’s Boyfriends from Hell (Anthology)
• David Sedaris’ Naked (Humour)
• Kate Fagan’s The Long Moment (Poetry)
• Michael Farrell’s Ode Ode (Poetry)

Around 2002

• Michael Cunningham’s Home at the End of the World (Novel)
• David Eberschoff’s Rose City (Short Fiction)
• Michael Chabon’s Adventures of Cavalier and Clay (Novel)
• Michael Ondaatje’s Anil’s Ghost (Novel)
• Martin Foreman’s Butterfly’s Wing (Novel)
• Noel Alumnit’s Letters to Montgomery Clift (Novel)
• Michael Smith’s Cumberland (Novel)
• Michael Cunningham’s Flesh and Blood (Novel)
• Louis Bernieres’ Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (Novel)
• Jonathan Franzen’s the Corrections (Novel)
• Imogen Edward Jones’ My Canape Hell (Novel)
• Scott Heim’s Mysterious Skin (Novel)
• Colm Toibin’s The Story of the Night (Novel)
• Eva Sebold’s The Lovely Bones (Novel)
• Ursula Leguin’s The Other Wind (Novel)
• Seamus Heaney’ The Open Ground (Poetry – Collected)

Around 2001

• Dave Egger’s A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (Novel/Autobiography)
• Jhumpa Lamphiri’s Interpreter of Maladies (Short Fiction)
• Michael Cunningham’s The Hours (Novel)
• Neal Drinnan’s Glove Puppet (Novel)
• J.M. Coetzee’s Disgrace (Novel)
• Nicholas Jose’s The Red Thread (Novel)
• Blaine Marchand’s Bodily Presence (Poetry)
• Billeh Nickerson’s Asthmatic Glassblower (Poetry)
• Mitch Cullin’s From The Place in the Valley Deep in the Forest (Short Fiction)
• Steve Kluger’s Last Days of Summer (Novel)
• Neal Drinnan’s Pussy’s Bow (Novel)
• Elizabeth Knox’s Vintner’s Luck (Novel)
• Edmund White’s Farewell Symphony (Novel)
• Francisco Ibanez’s Flesh Wounds and Purple Flowers (Novel)
• Bruno Bouchet’s The Girls (Novel)
• Dennis Altman’s Global Sex (Non-Fiction)
• Micha Ramaker’s Art of Pleasure (Non-Fiction)
• Marshall Moore’s the Concrete Sky (Novel)