I just finished River of Darkness, by Rennie Airth. It's a mystery/thriller about a police detective in post WWI England, dealing with the aftermath of both the war and his own personal tragedies. Really well written and with a great sense of place and time. It manages to feel of the period without being arch or self-consciously Olde Fashioned. I recommend it highly.

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How to build a canon NY Times poll on the greatest work of American fiction of the last 25 years.

I'm not surprised that Beloved won. It seemed the most universally acclaimed book since Gravity's Rainbow. I was a little surprised that (a) that's the only Toni Morrison book among the top choices and (b) that so many of Philip Roth's later works were cited.

Well, not entirely surprised since I love Roth, but I haven't kept up with his career at all and it's nice to see that he and Don Delillo have both been cranking out the quality work with regularity. Corwood will be happy to see that Cormac gets his props too. Interesting that Housekeeping got cited. I knew people liked it, but I didn't realize that it had that kind of consensus. Also pleased to see Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried sustaining its reputation.

I would have found it more useful if they'd asked each voter to pick 5 or 10 books, and not just 1.

People voted for Cormac McC's Border Trilogy over Blood Meridian! That's some kind of insane troll logic.

Beloved is the only thing on that list I've read. Of course, I kept thinking, "What about -- oh, right, that's not by an American." I am a little surprised that there's no Auster in there, though.

Beloved is also the only book on that list I have read. But Philip Roth seems to drive me bugfuck, so I guess that is unsurprising.

I was stunned by how many of the top choices were by novelists in their 70s. I don't read a lot of literary fiction in general, but it seems to me that there might be some good younger writers out there who got missed? It seemed like a lot of these guys (Roth, DeLillo, Updike)were canonized longer ago than 25 years, and their newer works got put on the list by default. I would love to know the age/demographic of the people surveyed.

For some reason Toni Morrison seems a much more modern writer to me than Roth or Updike.

I'm not a Roth fan, but The Things They Carried is on my top ten, for sure. (Hec, I think you and I have had that conversation before.)

I forgot to add that John Updike drives me MORE bugfuck than Philip Roth. @$#%! Rabbit.

I think this may be why I was an unsuccessful English major. I wanted to LIKE everything I read. But seriously, I would much rather read Thomas Hardy (whom everyone else seems to hate) or Theodore Dreiser than either Updike or Roth.

I also think that the emergance of "literary fiction" has caused the demise of many novels which are actually enjoyable. I mean, Shakespeare and Dickens and even Hemingway, I think, were writing for an audience who wanted to enjoy their works in some way. I feel like Roth, DeLillo, Updike et als are writing to "create literature".

I would love to know the age/demographic of the people surveyed.

The respondents are listed here. Or at least, those are the people invited to respond. The accompanying article (and wow, A.O. Scott makes Stephen Hunter seem terse) says that not everyone replied, and that some who did reply refused to name a single book.