Intriguing reading from 2005

Newley Purnell recently posted his annual Bloggers’ Favorite Books listing, which includes favorite 2005 reads from the likes of Malcolm Gladwell, Boing Boing, Instapundit, and MoorishGirl.

Newley also queried me about the most intriguing books I read in 2005, and this is what I told him:

Three of the most enjoyable books I read in 2005 were Michael Bamberger’s Wonderland, J. Maarten Troost’s The Sex Lives of Cannibals, and Matt Ridley’s The Red Queen. Bamberger’s book, which recounts a year in the life of a Pennsylvania high school, was a pleasure to read — not only in its engaging nonfiction storytelling, but also in its empathetic, non-sensationalistic take on what it’s like to be an American teenager in the 2000’s. Troost’s book is the account of two years he spent with his NGO-worker wife on the Equatorial Pacific archipelago of Kiribati — and its take on the idiosyncrasies of life on an isolated atoll makes for the funniest travel reading in recent memory. Less engaging — but even more fascinating — was Ridley’s examination of evolutionary psychology, using examples from the animal kingdom to show how all creatures (including humans) have developed their various social and sexual idiosyncrasies.

Elsewhere in the realm of nonfiction, I spent some time this year delving into readings on the role of social class in the United States. I was inspired to do this after reading Bill McKibben’s April Harper’s article about alternative agriculture in Cuba — which was thematically identical to a project proposal I submitted with my failed Pew Fellowship application in 2003. McKibben is a terrific writer, and I didn’t suspect him of stealing my idea — but I was irritated that the Pew Fellowship had rejected a proposal that would have scooped McKibben’s Harper’s story by a year; instead giving away a majority (70%) of the fellowship slots to (what I considered unremarkable) projects by candidates with Ivy League credentials. As a person who was making $3.35 an hour threshing wheat in Kansas when I was a considering collegiate options at age 17 (i.e., Ivy League schooling was never a consideration), I was flabbergasted that the Pew Fellowship would give most of its financial and professional assistance to people who obviously hailed from a background of social and economic privilege. Indeed, as successful as I’ve become as a freelance writer over the years, I have yet to receive a single financial grant or fellowship — most of which go to candidates whose only financial shortcoming would seem to be student-loan paybacks to elite universities.

Hence, I vented my frustrations by delving into a literary examination of the American class system, digging into titles such as David Brooks’ humorous (if occasionally over-generalized) Bobos in Paradise, and Paul Fussell’s snarky-yet-astute Class: A Guide Through the American Status System. Also compelling (if not always fully articulate) was Jim Goad’s angry Redneck Manifesto — which, while at times lacking in even-handedness, made a strong case for the fact that poor, white, rural Americans receive little assistance or sympathy from the powers-that-be on both sides of the political spectrum.

As for fiction in 2005, many of the novels I read this year were intriguingly experimental in form — including Milan Kundera’s Immortality and Alan Lightman’s Einstein’s Dreams. My favorite was Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, which tantalizingly toyed with the line between fiction and nonfiction, and examined the dubious accuracy of memory in storytelling.

Finally, I re-read in 2005 a number of books that have been favorites since I was a teenager, including John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row and Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (which is possibly my favorite book ever). Just as it’s nice to occasionally revisit old friends in various corners of the world, it was a keen pleasure to reacquaint myself with Doc, Mac and the Boys, and Lee the Grocer in depression-era Monterey — as well as Yossarian, Major Major, Natley’s whore, and various other characters off the coast of Italy in the waning days of WWII. I’d reckon in another couple years, I’ll afford myself the pleasure of visiting them again.

For the full list of bloggers’ favorite 2005 books, click here.