It’s the
season of Top Ten Books of 2024, Best of 2024, Our picks for 2024, Most Notable, etc. It’s a curators’ frenzy telling us what we should value and appreciate about
the year’s creative output.
It’s natural for human beings to sort things, and we do it all the time. It’s also not a bad thing to learn what other people think about anything, be it sanitizer wipes, Baus Haus architecture or best sellers. It can be illuminating and helpful, since there’s too much to know in the world, and not enough time to absorb it all on your own.
However, there’s nothing sillier than Top Ten, or Best Of lists of books, and I advise everyone to give scant regard to the frothy commotion. Here are my Top Ten reasons why:
1. In a few years, most of the books
on these lists will be forgotten.
2. It’s all entirely
subjective. These lists are composed by
people who have their own tastes and predilections, and though well informed,
mean nothing to those of us with contrary, varied opinions.
3. Critics and readers are not the same people. Critics, the ones who make the Best Of lists, are heavily invested in their aesthetic judgements, and far more committed to the context in which any given work is developed. This means they overthink everything, and are speaking more to their competing reviewers than to the rest of us. We just want to read something we like. That enriches us. We don’t care about all the nonsense they care about.
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| Okay, it's for movies, but you get the idea |
4. If you asked every book reader to
make their own Best Of list, and put them all together, it would likely include
the entire print run of every publisher in the country.
5. You will never read a Best Of
list without being insulted. Or
outraged. Or mildly annoyed. They’ll
leave off your favorite book or rhapsodize over a piece of crap. It’s
not worth the increased blood pressure and intestinal distress.
6. You can’t separate popularity
from artistic success. Lousy books can
sell a lot of copies, great books can fade into obscurity a day after they’re released. Lists tend to favor books with lots of sales,
whatever the quality. They also tend to
confuse social impact with literary merit.
You need to figure out what they mean by Best, which isn’t worth the
time or effort.
7. Only time will tell which of this
year’s works will endure. Some do, for
decades or centuries, because of some ineffable quality that transcend the immediate. And even that may wane over time. The Best Books of All Time list keeps
changing. And it always will.
8. There is no Best. Every work has it’s own particular charms,
and saying one is better than another is like saying an apple is always better
than an orange, which is better than a peach.
Not to say there are no objective criteria, but a lot of books will meet
the minimum requirements, and from there, it’s up to the reader to decide.
9. There’s no harm in reading the
Top Ten list for 2024, but don’t expect to be overwhelmed with gratitude for
the opportunity. You can just as well browse
around a library or bookstore, or listen to your friends and relatives, who are
no greater authorities, but at least might share similar preferences.
10. All love is good love; all books you like are good books. Lists are for scorekeepers, snobs and fussbudgets.
I really like your last point, Chris! All books you like are good books - I so agree! I guess, for me, the possible use of lists would be that I might meet some new authors to read from them. For instance, EQMM said, "If you like Donald Westlake, you will probably like Melodie Campbell" - that sort of thing. I'd love to see a list of ten books that are compared to mine, for instance. I long to read the sort of thing I love to write, and can rarely find them.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the lists are subjective (including mine) but 1) they are FUN, including the outrage/desire to argue, and 2) they give us a chance to learn about books/stories we wouldn't have known about otherwise. I have said for years that of the stories published in any year 10-20% are worthy of being nominated for some sort of honor including best of lists, and after that it depends on who is judging them. SO the more best of lists, from more varied judges, the better. Interesting essay!
ReplyDeleteLists by critics and famous writers aren't the only ones out there. On mystery lovers e-list DorothyL, they're currently collecting members' Top Ten Reads of the year, not necessarily published in 2024. I always get a few winners among the authors new to me that I discover through those lists. It helps that I know some members' tastes after schmoozing about crime fiction with them online for many years. Also, if we concur on seven books, their three that I haven't read may suit me too. Btw, the one that's appearing on almost everyone's list this year is Allison Montclair's Murder at the White Palace, seventh in the brilliant and delightful Sparks & Bainbridge series set in post-WWII London. Montclair is a pseudonym of Alan Gordon, author of the Fools Guild medieval mysteries, who writes women like a woman, and that's a high compliment.
ReplyDeleteIn researching articles, I've been astonished and dismayed how a number of wildly popular authors utterly evaporate within decades. If it weren't for films of their novels, today's generation wouldn't know they ever existed.
ReplyDeleteI will happily concede to all commentors that Best Of lists are good for alerting you to new works you wouldn't have otherwise discovered. I'm just too much of an old cynic to give creedance to the opinions of people I don't know, always expecting there's a hidden axe being grinded somewhere.
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