Ten of the best unconsummated passions in fiction

Someone at the Guardian named ten of the best unconsummated passions in fiction.

One novel on the list:

The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford

Another that ends in suicide. Edward Ashburnham, the "good soldier" of the title, is a beautifully mannered serial adulterer. His inclinations catch up with him, however, when he falls for the teenage Nancy, who is his ward. This girl is unattainable, so she gets sent to India and he gets the shotgun out of its case.

Read about the other nine unconsummated passions on the Guardian's list.

The Good Soldier also appears on the list of 10 great novels with terrible original titles and Most important books: Mary Gordon.

Read Ford Madox Ford and the page 99 test.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top ten black comedies

Back in 2005 the novelist Tiffany Murray named her top ten "books that deal in the murky and contrary depths of dark humour" for the Guardian.

One item on the list:

Slaughterhouse-5 by Kurt Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut's semi-autobiographical classic was 24 years in the making: "So it goes". The unspeakablility of war where all that follows Dresden's destruction is the 'Poo-tee-weet' of a bird. Like his protagonist Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut was a prisoner of war inside a meat-locker beneath a slaughterhouse as Dresden was fireballed and bombed. It is unknown whether he, like Billy, was also abducted by aliens.

Read about all ten titles on Murray's list.

Slaughterhouse-5 also made Sebastian Beaumont's top 10 list of books about psychological journeys.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best floggings

At the Guardian, John Mullan named ten of the best floggings in fiction.

One novel on the list:

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

Corporal punishment commonly epitomises the collapse of humanity in Tolstoy's fiction. Kind, peaceable Pierre comes upon a flogging of a French cook in a Moscow square. Accused of being a spy, the Frenchman is flogged. A crowd of "officials, burghers, shopkeepers, peasants and women in cloaks and in pelisses" looks on in satisfaction.

Read about all ten floggings on Mullan's list.

War and Peace also appears on Niall Ferguson's 5 most important books list and Norman Mailer's top ten works of literature list.

Michael Jubien had some quality insights on War and Peace at Writers Read.

--Marshal Zeringue

Andre Dubus III: five most essential books

Andre Dubus III, a National Book Award finalist for his novel House of Sand and Fog, is the author of most recently of The Garden of Last Days, a story of terrorists in Florida.

He told Newsweek about his five most essential books.

One title on the list:

Selected Stories by Alice Munro.

Her characters are more alive than some living human beings!

Read about all five books on Dubus' list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five best books with characters on the edge

For the Wall Street Journal, Lynne Sharon Schwartz named her favorite novels featuring characters on the edge.

Number One on her list:

I'm Not Stiller
by Max Frisch
Abelard-Schuman, 1958

Can a person erase his unsatisfactory past by an act of will? Can an invented self feel more authentic than the life cast aside? Those are the questions posed by the Swiss writer Max Frisch (1911-91) in his novel "I'm Not Stiller," a brilliant look at the nature of identity. Arrested after a scuffle with a customs officer in a train station, Anatol Stiller insists that the police have the wrong man, despite ample evidence to the contrary. Instead he claims to be Jim White, an American with a colorful history of adventure and derring-do -- a far cry from the actual Stiller, a tormented Swiss sculptor alienated from his work, his wife and his native land. Stiller's story (first published in German in 1954), with digressions on art, politics and marriage, makes fascinating reading for anyone who has ever wished to start over as someone new.

Read about all five books on Schwartz's list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Best books: James Toback

Award-winning screenwriter and director James Toback named a best books list of six favorite literary works that have figured into his films.

One title on the list:

Complete Tales & Poems of Edgar Allan Poe (Vintage, $18)

In When Will I Be Loved, I have an actor read “The Bells” out loud in the background as Neve Campbell walks through the courtyard of New York’s Museum of Natural History. Poe’s rhythms reign! No poem in the English language comes closer to fusing literature and music.

Read about all six works on Toback's list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top ten modern Irish crime novels

At the Guardian, novelist Brian McGilloway named his top ten modern Irish crime novels.

Number One on the list:

The Wrong Kind of Blood by Declan Hughes

Declan Hughes has crafted a superb series based on his PI, Ed Loy, winning the Shamus Award and being shortlisted for this year's Edgar in the US. The debut novel in the series, The Wrong Kind of Blood, has, among many other things, a corking first line and an unforgettable scene involving a shed, some gardening implements and a psychotic hoodlum called Podge that showcases Hughes's skill in handling dialogue.

Read about all ten titles on McGilloway's list.

The Page 69 Test: The Price of Blood (the 3d Ed Loy novel).

Related: see Declan Burke's top ten list of Irish crime fiction at The Rap Sheet.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 US out of print books of 2008

BookFinder.com's research came up with "the top 10 most sought-after out of print books in America in 2008."

One book on the list:

Promise Me Tomorrow (1984) by Nora Roberts

An early novel that the bestselling romance novelist refuses to reprint, describing it as “mediocre”

Check out the complete list.

Read about a few titles on the 2006 list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten best locks of hair in fiction

At the Guardian, John Mullan named ten of the best locks of hair in fiction.

One novel on the list:

The Woodlanders, by Thomas Hardy

Marty South has only her beautiful hair to qualify her for anyone's attention. A rich lady sees her in church and wants some of it to attach to her own. Initially Marty resists the offers of Mr Percomb the barber, but eventually poverty forces her to his shop, with "the chestnut locks" wrapped in "a brown-paper packet". Humiliation is complete.

Read about all ten locks of hair on Mullan's list.

The Page 99 Test: Thomas Hardy's The Woodlanders.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 most frequently stolen books

For the Guardian, Alison Flood compiled a list of the top 10 most frequently stolen books.

One book on the chart:

Abbie Hoffman: Steal This Book

This 1970 US counter-cultural classic does what it says on the tin: a training manual containing advice on the way to steal credit cards, grow marijuana and, among other things, obtain a free buffalo from the US Department of the Interior. In a 1971 article in Rolling Stone, Izak Haber claimed that Hoffman had in fact stolen his idea for the book.

Read about all ten titles on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best deserts in literature

At the Guardian, John Mullan named ten of the best deserts in literature.

One novel on the list:

Dune by Frank Herbert

This sci-fi epic is set on the planet of Arrakis and realises a whole desert world. Herbert's characters may be unconvincing, but his sandy planet, with its sandtrout, sandplankton and giant sandworms , is vividly imagined.

Read about all ten deserts on Mullan's list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five best books on language

Michael Quinion, author of Gallimaufry: A Hodgepodge of Our Vanishing Vocabulary, named a five best list of books on language for the Wall Street Journal.

Number One on his list:

The Stories of English
by David Crystal
Overlook, 2004

This richly textured, nontechnical account of the evolution of English is fascinating because it interweaves multiple narratives. In parallel with the standard language, David Crystal discusses varieties usually considered nonstandard -- dialect, slang and the speech of ethnic minorities -- which previously hadn't received the same level of attention. Traditionalist speakers and grammarians deplore such varieties as inferior or corrupt, but they are increasingly becoming accepted as legitimate, not least because only one in three speakers of English now has it as a mother tongue. With a cornucopia of examples that range from "The Canterbury Tales" to "The Lord of the Rings," and from the correspondence of medieval kings to Internet chatroom gossip, Crystal's exposition is a delight.

Read about the other books on Quinion's list.

Also read about David Crystal's top 10 books on the English language and five best books on the history and use of English.

--Marshal Zeringue