Absolutely! That really cemented my Zola love. I'm so happy I'm done with university, and I can read in 2025! Looking forward to more Zola and Balzac soon. Those French writers, they really have the good stuff. That's what kills me about attending those god-damn "creative writing" classes at university, none of the kids like to read, and none of them seem brave enough to go over to Europe and get some culture. Happy 2025 to you Jack! Hope you are enjoying retirement!
Thanks Deb, I was annoyed with this video because I checked the battery on the telephone and found I was running low. Maybe it was for the best. I already did a review of most of all of those books, so there isn't any need to go into raptures over them all over again. Thanks for saying that about my communication skills, I've been worried that attending university has retrograded my cognitive abilities.
Thank you Grant for this rundown--I found a copy of the Ogre, on your recommendation, now I've just got to get reading it. As usual there are so many other books calling out to me at any given time. So many books, so little time scenario. All the best to you and yours in this holiday season and every season.
Hello Sal, I'm so happy to hear you found a copy of The Ogre, most of the comments are telling me it is unavailable. Trust me, I know how you feel. Let me know when you get to reading it. I was all-in when I read the line; "A loaf of bread doesn't complain about how much it's been eaten." (this was in response to his wife telling him he was a selfish lover) and I thought, 'This book is going to be one of the good ones!' Thanks so much for your support and leaving all the comments on the videos. Hope you are enjoying your Holidays and feeling good about the world. Looking forward to hearing from you in 2025!
Great video Grant! Looking up Samurai by Shusaku Endo asap❤ Unfortunately The Ogre isn’t available on Amazon here in Europe so I’m hoping to be lucky and find it in a thrift shop someday.
There is so much good stuff in The Samurai. I've been writing about it today, replying to the comments, and thinking of all the great scenes in that book. I am not a religious person, but I will admit, several of the scenes where he goes deep into what it means to have faith really caught me feeling some feelings. There's probably plenty of French versions around, but for the non-French speakers, like myself, you will really be hitting the jackpot if you find a copy in a thrift store. It's terrible how these great books can fade away. This book won the highest literary award in France, and people can't find copies of it! It's a tragedy. I've noticed that if there are film versions of books, it gives them a lot more longevity. It's sad, but it seems to be true. And I don't think there will ever be a film version of this book.
This is a fascinating and varied list. The Ogre and Deliverance are now on my TBR. My top six for 2024: The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (1905) Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin (1956) Fingersmith by Sarah Waters (2002) Oxherding Tale by Charles R. Johnson (1982) The Mad and The Bad by Jean-Patrick Manchette (1972) In the Cut by Susanna Moore (1995) Honorable mentions: The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector (1977) Desperate Characters by Paula Fox (1970) Who Killed Palomino Molero by Mario Vargas Llosa (1986)
Hello Contraband, great list! I added several of those to my TBR list (which is an ever-growing monster). I had a great professor who was a specialist in Edith Wharton, so I really got some great insights into The House of Mirth. Actually, the thing I remember most from that class is that he told us, Edith Wharton was born Edith Jones. Her family was so wealthy that the phrase 'Keeping up with the Joneses' originated with her family. She really never had to write any books to support herself. If you liked The House of Mirth I highly recommend The Custom of the Country, that was one of my favourite books from 2023, and I've been told that Ethan From is also a great one. I hope you will enjoy Deliverance, that book is really exciting. And good luck with The Ogre. Man, it has some of the darkest stuff in there. Thanks for writing!
@grantlovesbooks that's great trivia re Edith Wharton! My TBR has ballooned to 129 nonfiction and poetry titles and around 200 fiction titles. This is one of the perils of BookTube. 🤦♂️
@@Contraband_Pigments It's a good reason to take care of your health, to live long and read long. RUclips really has become a great place to learn about what to read. It used to be so hard to find books, you would have to know people who knew about books and ask them. It sounds a little ridiculous now, but when I was in my 20's the struggle was real!
Thank you for the list! I added Mrs. Palfrey to my tbr. You make an excellent point about teenagers. It was normal to marry by age 15, so there was just childhood and adulthood. The Ogre sounds fascinating but too perverse for me. 😮
Hello Dina, I hope you will enjoy Mrs. Palfrey, so beautiful, and funny, and really a unique story. Even though it is not too old, it really feels like a novel from a different time. It's funny how 'teenagers' are a recent invention. And it seems we are still unsure about how to best manage this difficult transitional period in everyone's lives. The Ogre is a great one, but it is full of some dark stuff, really not for everyone. Let me know what you think of Mrs. Palfrey when you get round to reading it. Thanks for writing!
beautiful collection! I also read The Samurai this year, Mrs. Palfrey...I'm afraid it might make me too sad. On the other hand, despite being tough but on different themes, Germinal is on the list. The Berlin Stories, very interested but it's sold out here, as the Ogre, no current edition in Pt. Le Grand Meaulnes, An Artist Of The Floating World, also on the list! I'll leave you my best 6 of this year too (with an asterisk on the ones I read because of your videos😉): From here to eternity-J.Jones Eugénie Grandet-Balzac* Paviliom of woman-Pearl Buck So long, see you tomorrow-W.Maxwell* Amulet-Bolano The Samurai-Endo* Merry Christmas Grant!
Hello Christina! You read From Here to Eternity this year and didn't tell me! I really loved that book (although it did start to drag when he went to the stockade). What did you think of Amulet? I've only read The Savage Detectives, and it didn't fill me with a lot of enthusiasm to read more Bolano too quickly. And how did you feel about The Samurai? I really loved the conflict between the dutiful samurai and the zealous missionary. That is some beautiful international reading. Don't be too intimidated by Mrs. Palfrey, I found the ending of The Samurai to be a lot more of a downer. Even though, it really does hit some sentimental heartstrings pretty hard. It is well worth the experience. Thanks for writing!
Merry Christmas to you as well! Little bit strange in Japan, kind of like everyone knows it's Christmas, but no one knows what to do about it. There's some old folks out on the field opposite the house. They are playing some kind of a game like golf + croquet, I'm half tempted to join them!
great video and list. Nice insights on Germinal and The Samurai. Berlin Stories were a Christmas gift so it holds that place in my heart, nice written. Have to check out the Ogre,. good list and enjoyable vid. cheers and happy holidays
Thanks Timothy. I hope you'll be able to find a copy of The Ogre, several people are writing to tell me it is hard to get or out of print. I got really lucky in a very strange little backwater in Muskoka Ontario. That was really a great find, and I probably would never have read that book if I hadn't of noticed it that day. Berlin Stories is really a lot of fun, one of the best drinking-party scenes I've ever read. Thanks for writing, Happy Holidays to you!
My pleasure Deb! It's kind of funny, when I think back. When I started the channel, I wanted to make a record of the great books I was reading. I never really thought of 'an audience.' I always thought, 'If people like the videos, great. If they don't like them, they've got plenty of others to choose from. I'll make my videos my own way.' So it is always a special, and surprising, pleasure for me that you and others enjoy my videos. Thanks always for all your support!
Hello 3rdpill! You're a lucky one, several people are telling me The Ogre is a rare find these days. 1993, god-damn those were some fun years! That was the year I first went to university (for one single year). But I discovered Pinter and Stoppard and Vonnegut, all unknown to be before then. I think that was when I began to realize how much there was to read. And there was no internet then, so I would just read everything by the writers I liked. I read all the plays of Pinter and Stoppard, all the novels of Vonnegut (even his very poor play). It really wasn't until I started working on The Modern Library's list that I really began to branch out a lot more widely. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you! (Sorry to hear about that Christmas Market attack. I went to the big Christmas Market one year in Coln, and it was Way too crowded for me. I can't stand crowds, I really get anxious in a crowd.)
@@grantlovesbooks I don't like crowds too. I left one concert in Tokyo because it was too crowded. The Ogre was back then newly in print, I guess. And a few years later there was the German film adaptation. Luckily the novel was rereleased a few wseeks ago (in Germany). 1993, that was one year before I was moving in a new city to go to the university. And, yes, Vonnegut was the big thing for me. :-) And Dick and Borges, and Cortázar. - - - By the way, since you are reading a lot Japanese literature: If you know some good Japanese ghost stories (I am a little bit doubtful that you do) please tell me. I am working at the moment on an anthology --- (it looks fine so far, but I still have 200 pages to fill ...). All the best!
@@the3rdpillblog934 Any time I hear about people being crushed in an unmovable crowd I am nearly sick. That situation in Korea a few years ago, I think it was Halloween when all those teenagers got crushed in a small corridor. And the last Love Parade in Berlin when the same thing happened. There's really no escape if you are in it. I was once in a mob leaving a concert at the Budapest Sziget festival. Goran Bregovitc stopped playing and EVERYONE got up to leave at the one exit point. People were pushing me from behind and I had to push the people in front of me. I feel sick just remembering it. Sorry, don't think I know any Ghost stories, of any kind, I don't think. Is there a movie of The Ogre! Good God they'll try to make a film out of any book it seems. I really hate the whole business. They want to capitalize on a built-in audience, either snobs who want to pretend they have read the book, or students who are trying to avoid reading the book. And those artsy movies are the ones that usually get all the awards.
@@grantlovesbooks Yeah, it is by Volker Schlöndorff. I remembering it as being okay (but haven't seen it since it came out in 1996) - at least for a German/French film (I guess the good parts are from the French, haha).
Glen, love your recommendations especially the translated Japanese authors. For 2024 I read The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishinguro, Cult X , Evil and the Mask by Fuminari Nakamura, and my now favorite crime/detective noir author Natsuo Kirino for Out, Grotesque. My next tbr is gonna be a strange one as well into 2025...'Children of the Dead' by Elfriede Jelinik (2024), translated from the German-Austrian. Best wishes for 2025! You are front and center now Mr. Background Actor😎
Thanks James! I was thinking, 'Who the hell is Glen?' Let me know which books in 2025 really stand out for you. I keep imagining that one day I'm going to read all of the books on my shelves, but then another little evil part of me says, 'Even if you do, you still have to re-read everything at least one more time.' There have been so many books where I've said to myself, 'I'll get it more than now on the second read.'
So glad you liked Germinal. Happy 2025 Grant!
Absolutely! That really cemented my Zola love. I'm so happy I'm done with university, and I can read in 2025! Looking forward to more Zola and Balzac soon. Those French writers, they really have the good stuff. That's what kills me about attending those god-damn "creative writing" classes at university, none of the kids like to read, and none of them seem brave enough to go over to Europe and get some culture.
Happy 2025 to you Jack! Hope you are enjoying retirement!
Excellent communication skills. Thanks.
Thanks Deb, I was annoyed with this video because I checked the battery on the telephone and found I was running low. Maybe it was for the best. I already did a review of most of all of those books, so there isn't any need to go into raptures over them all over again.
Thanks for saying that about my communication skills, I've been worried that attending university has retrograded my cognitive abilities.
Happy Christmas Grant
Thanks Pete! Happy Christmas to you, as well!
Thank you Grant for this rundown--I found a copy of the Ogre, on your recommendation, now I've just got to get reading it. As usual there are so many other books calling out to me at any given time. So many books, so little time scenario. All the best to you and yours in this holiday season and every season.
Hello Sal, I'm so happy to hear you found a copy of The Ogre, most of the comments are telling me it is unavailable.
Trust me, I know how you feel. Let me know when you get to reading it. I was all-in when I read the line; "A loaf of bread doesn't complain about how much it's been eaten." (this was in response to his wife telling him he was a selfish lover) and I thought, 'This book is going to be one of the good ones!'
Thanks so much for your support and leaving all the comments on the videos. Hope you are enjoying your Holidays and feeling good about the world. Looking forward to hearing from you in 2025!
Great video Grant! Looking up Samurai by Shusaku Endo asap❤
Unfortunately The Ogre isn’t available on Amazon here in Europe so I’m hoping to be lucky and find it in a thrift shop someday.
There is so much good stuff in The Samurai. I've been writing about it today, replying to the comments, and thinking of all the great scenes in that book. I am not a religious person, but I will admit, several of the scenes where he goes deep into what it means to have faith really caught me feeling some feelings.
There's probably plenty of French versions around, but for the non-French speakers, like myself, you will really be hitting the jackpot if you find a copy in a thrift store.
It's terrible how these great books can fade away. This book won the highest literary award in France, and people can't find copies of it! It's a tragedy.
I've noticed that if there are film versions of books, it gives them a lot more longevity. It's sad, but it seems to be true. And I don't think there will ever be a film version of this book.
This is a fascinating and varied list. The Ogre and Deliverance are now on my TBR.
My top six for 2024:
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (1905)
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin (1956)
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters (2002)
Oxherding Tale by Charles R. Johnson (1982)
The Mad and The Bad by Jean-Patrick Manchette (1972)
In the Cut by Susanna Moore (1995)
Honorable mentions:
The Hour of the Star by Clarice Lispector (1977)
Desperate Characters by Paula Fox (1970)
Who Killed Palomino Molero by Mario Vargas Llosa (1986)
Hello Contraband, great list! I added several of those to my TBR list (which is an ever-growing monster).
I had a great professor who was a specialist in Edith Wharton, so I really got some great insights into The House of Mirth.
Actually, the thing I remember most from that class is that he told us, Edith Wharton was born Edith Jones. Her family was so wealthy that the phrase 'Keeping up with the Joneses' originated with her family.
She really never had to write any books to support herself.
If you liked The House of Mirth I highly recommend The Custom of the Country, that was one of my favourite books from 2023, and I've been told that Ethan From is also a great one.
I hope you will enjoy Deliverance, that book is really exciting. And good luck with The Ogre. Man, it has some of the darkest stuff in there.
Thanks for writing!
@grantlovesbooks that's great trivia re Edith Wharton! My TBR has ballooned to 129 nonfiction and poetry titles and around 200 fiction titles. This is one of the perils of BookTube. 🤦♂️
@@Contraband_Pigments It's a good reason to take care of your health, to live long and read long.
RUclips really has become a great place to learn about what to read. It used to be so hard to find books, you would have to know people who knew about books and ask them. It sounds a little ridiculous now, but when I was in my 20's the struggle was real!
Thank you for the list! I added Mrs. Palfrey to my tbr. You make an excellent point about teenagers. It was normal to marry by age 15, so there was just childhood and adulthood. The Ogre sounds fascinating but too perverse for me. 😮
Hello Dina, I hope you will enjoy Mrs. Palfrey, so beautiful, and funny, and really a unique story. Even though it is not too old, it really feels like a novel from a different time.
It's funny how 'teenagers' are a recent invention. And it seems we are still unsure about how to best manage this difficult transitional period in everyone's lives.
The Ogre is a great one, but it is full of some dark stuff, really not for everyone.
Let me know what you think of Mrs. Palfrey when you get round to reading it. Thanks for writing!
beautiful collection! I also read The Samurai this year, Mrs. Palfrey...I'm afraid it might make me too sad. On the other hand, despite being tough but on different themes, Germinal is on the list. The Berlin Stories, very interested but it's sold out here, as the Ogre, no current edition in Pt. Le Grand Meaulnes, An Artist Of The Floating World, also on the list! I'll leave you my best 6 of this year too (with an asterisk on the ones I read because of your videos😉):
From here to eternity-J.Jones
Eugénie Grandet-Balzac*
Paviliom of woman-Pearl Buck
So long, see you tomorrow-W.Maxwell*
Amulet-Bolano
The Samurai-Endo*
Merry Christmas Grant!
Hello Christina! You read From Here to Eternity this year and didn't tell me! I really loved that book (although it did start to drag when he went to the stockade). What did you think of Amulet? I've only read The Savage Detectives, and it didn't fill me with a lot of enthusiasm to read more Bolano too quickly.
And how did you feel about The Samurai? I really loved the conflict between the dutiful samurai and the zealous missionary.
That is some beautiful international reading.
Don't be too intimidated by Mrs. Palfrey, I found the ending of The Samurai to be a lot more of a downer. Even though, it really does hit some sentimental heartstrings pretty hard. It is well worth the experience.
Thanks for writing!
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas to you as well! Little bit strange in Japan, kind of like everyone knows it's Christmas, but no one knows what to do about it. There's some old folks out on the field opposite the house. They are playing some kind of a game like golf + croquet, I'm half tempted to join them!
great video and list. Nice insights on Germinal and The Samurai. Berlin Stories were a Christmas gift so it holds that place in my heart, nice written. Have to check out the Ogre,. good list and enjoyable vid. cheers and happy holidays
Thanks Timothy. I hope you'll be able to find a copy of The Ogre, several people are writing to tell me it is hard to get or out of print. I got really lucky in a very strange little backwater in Muskoka Ontario. That was really a great find, and I probably would never have read that book if I hadn't of noticed it that day.
Berlin Stories is really a lot of fun, one of the best drinking-party scenes I've ever read.
Thanks for writing, Happy Holidays to you!
Thanks so much, Grant.
My pleasure Deb! It's kind of funny, when I think back. When I started the channel, I wanted to make a record of the great books I was reading. I never really thought of 'an audience.' I always thought, 'If people like the videos, great. If they don't like them, they've got plenty of others to choose from. I'll make my videos my own way.'
So it is always a special, and surprising, pleasure for me that you and others enjoy my videos. Thanks always for all your support!
Hey Grant, I love the Tournier novel; have read it ... well, I think something like 1993? I wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year!
Hello 3rdpill! You're a lucky one, several people are telling me The Ogre is a rare find these days. 1993, god-damn those were some fun years! That was the year I first went to university (for one single year). But I discovered Pinter and Stoppard and Vonnegut, all unknown to be before then. I think that was when I began to realize how much there was to read.
And there was no internet then, so I would just read everything by the writers I liked. I read all the plays of Pinter and Stoppard, all the novels of Vonnegut (even his very poor play). It really wasn't until I started working on The Modern Library's list that I really began to branch out a lot more widely.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you! (Sorry to hear about that Christmas Market attack. I went to the big Christmas Market one year in Coln, and it was Way too crowded for me. I can't stand crowds, I really get anxious in a crowd.)
@@grantlovesbooks I don't like crowds too. I left one concert in Tokyo because it was too crowded. The Ogre was back then newly in print, I guess. And a few years later there was the German film adaptation. Luckily the novel was rereleased a few wseeks ago (in Germany). 1993, that was one year before I was moving in a new city to go to the university. And, yes, Vonnegut was the big thing for me. :-) And Dick and Borges, and Cortázar. - - - By the way, since you are reading a lot Japanese literature: If you know some good Japanese ghost stories (I am a little bit doubtful that you do) please tell me. I am working at the moment on an anthology --- (it looks fine so far, but I still have 200 pages to fill ...). All the best!
@@the3rdpillblog934 Any time I hear about people being crushed in an unmovable crowd I am nearly sick. That situation in Korea a few years ago, I think it was Halloween when all those teenagers got crushed in a small corridor. And the last Love Parade in Berlin when the same thing happened. There's really no escape if you are in it.
I was once in a mob leaving a concert at the Budapest Sziget festival. Goran Bregovitc stopped playing and EVERYONE got up to leave at the one exit point. People were pushing me from behind and I had to push the people in front of me. I feel sick just remembering it.
Sorry, don't think I know any Ghost stories, of any kind, I don't think.
Is there a movie of The Ogre! Good God they'll try to make a film out of any book it seems.
I really hate the whole business. They want to capitalize on a built-in audience, either snobs who want to pretend they have read the book, or students who are trying to avoid reading the book. And those artsy movies are the ones that usually get all the awards.
@@grantlovesbooks Yeah, it is by Volker Schlöndorff. I remembering it as being okay (but haven't seen it since it came out in 1996) - at least for a German/French film (I guess the good parts are from the French, haha).
Glen, love your recommendations especially the translated Japanese authors. For 2024 I read The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishinguro, Cult X , Evil and the Mask by Fuminari Nakamura, and my now favorite crime/detective noir author Natsuo Kirino for Out, Grotesque. My next tbr is gonna be a strange one as well into 2025...'Children of the Dead' by Elfriede Jelinik (2024), translated from the German-Austrian. Best wishes for 2025! You are front and center now Mr. Background Actor😎
It's Grant not Glen!
Thanks James! I was thinking, 'Who the hell is Glen?'
Let me know which books in 2025 really stand out for you. I keep imagining that one day I'm going to read all of the books on my shelves, but then another little evil part of me says, 'Even if you do, you still have to re-read everything at least one more time.' There have been so many books where I've said to myself, 'I'll get it more than now on the second read.'
One for the algorithm.😂
Thanks Deb!