Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon

Lord of Misrule, by Jaimy Gordon, was the dark horse winner of the 2010 National Book Award for fiction in December 2010.  It had a very small print run (2,000), and its author was relatively unknown.  Her life has changed.

No wonder.  Lord of Misrule is a gem.  It follows five characters through one year and four races at a rundown West Virginia racetrack.  The main characters are memorable.  Tommy Hansel is the "young fool", who has a scheme to run unknown horses quickly at long odds, make his money and get out.  Tommy's advance team and girlfriend, Maddie Koderer is the "frizzy haired girl" who is swept up by Tommy and, unbeknown to Maddie, is protected by her gangster uncle, Two-Tie.  Deucey Gifford is the old lady gypsy.  Finally, there is my favorite, Medicine Ed, the old horse groom. 

Gordon paints a beautiful portrait of the grittiness of a low stakes racetrack.  Her characters are stuck in a soulless track, looking for escape.  The first few sentences vividly describe what is to come:

"Inside the back gate of Indian Mound Downs, a hot-walking machine creaked round and round. In the judgment of Medicine Ed, walking a horse himself on the shedrow of Barn Z, the going-nowhere contraption must be the lost soul of this cheap racetrack where he been ended up at. It was stuck there in the gate, so you couldn't get out."

The writing is convincing and graphic.  Gordon carefully constructs each sentence.  This is a book to be read slowly and absorbed, not flipped through.  Two minor complaints about the novel : the shifts in perspective are a bit distracting and hard to follow and as someone who knows nothing about horse racing, I felt like I missed a few things.

The grittiness of the book reminded me of The Natural and the beauty and intensity of the writing brought to mind Tinkers by Paul Harding (the surprise 2010 Pulitzer Prize winner for fiction).

Recommendation:  It was great to see a small press outsider win one of the most prestigious literary awards in the United States.  Lord of Misrule is a beautifully written book that you should move up to the top of your literary reads.

Other reviews:
The Quivering Pen and Shelf Love.

Great House by Nicole Krauss

Great House is Nicole Krauss' highly anticipated 2010 novel.  Earlier in 2010, the New Yorker named Krauss as one of the New Yorker's top 20 writers under 40 (they also included her husband, Jonathan Safran Foer).  This book was a finalist for the 2010 National Book Award (the winner was Lord of Misrule). 

Krauss is a fantastic and powerful writer.  Her prose is nearly poetic.  At certain times, I found myself overpowered by her use of language and certain sections difficult to capture.  Maybe that was the point.

The book is a multivoiced narrative about loss.  There are four protagonists, who move seemlessly through time. Each character confronts loss (loss of a wife, a friend or a heritage and the Holocaust).  The voices are (mostly) linked to an object that moves through time and among the narrators.

What we learn from Krauss is that material objects are often displaced and difficult to reassemble.  However, ideas, knowledge, thoughts and belief can and do remain together.

This is not a page turner (nor is it intended to be).  Krauss demands work.  I enjoyed the book but it was not one of my favorites of the year.

Great Reads from 2010

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan.  A fantastic book which is a a series of freestanding short stories that together create a novel. The writing is magnificent and highly readable. Egan experiments with new forms, including an entire chapter written in a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation.  The New York Times selected it as one of the five best fiction books of 2010.  Her PBS interview is below.

Room by Emma Donoghue.  The voice in this book is powerful. It is the story, told from a child's perspective, of a boy and his mother being held captive in a room. The child (our narrator) is born in captivity and believes that this room is the entire universe. His mother creates an entire world for him and through him we see her stength and power. It is impossible to put this one down.  It was one of the 2010 Man Booker prize finalists.  The book trailer is below.

Freedom by Jonathan Franzen.  This was labelled as "THE" book of 2010. It made a huge prepublication splash, helped by Franzen's appearance on the cover of Time and photos of President Obama with a reviewer's copy on his Martha's Vineyard vacation.  Franzen is an incredible writer. The book lived up to the hype. The story itself is about a Midwestern family and the concept of freedom. It is very hard to summarize the plot but trust me it is a great book.  A recent interview with Franzen is below.  He comes across as reserved.  The writing is anything but.

The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman.  This was one of my favorite finds of the year.  In each chapter, Rachman tells the story about different people connected to a struggling Roman newspaper printed in English.  The characters are imperfect and their struggle is great to read.  I'm looking forward to his next book.  Rachman should have a bright future.  The NYT review was one of the first and could not have been more generous and dead on.

The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson.  If you haven't read these (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest), you have missed the publishing phenomenon that rivals Harry Potter.  Larsson was a Swedish writer who died young, leaving these manuscrips behind.  These books have become a literary sensation worldwide and have been mainstays on every bestseller list throughout 2010.

These are thriller mysteries. The writing is fine.  What makes these amazing is the storytelling.  Larsson packs a lot of punch in these books. In these books, Larsson attacks Swedish society, the abuse of women, sexuality, technology and the freedom of the press.  If you haven't read these, you should.  They are great beach / long winter night reads.

The Dragon Tattoo is a free standing book.  The last two continue with the same characters but are really just a single story.

There is a fourth manuscript that exists but it is stuck in litigation between Larsson's family and his long time girlfriend.  NYT story here.  The Swedish movie trailer is below.

Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart.  This is a satirical look at life in the near future.  China runs the world.  People are attached to the network, constantly monitoring their coolness factor and credit rating.  It is an excellent book and hysterical.  In June 2010, Shteyngart was named one of the top 20 writers under 40 by New Yorker.  Book trailer below.