People of Paper by Salvador Plascencia

This book tells the story of a group of characters, led by Fernando de la Fe whose wife's desertion leads him to decide to go to war against the author, known to the characters as Saturn, who is himself in the throes of grief after being deserted by a woman. The book uses post-modern and post-colonial methods to question everything from religion to immigration to the authority of authors. With all sorts of techniques and innovations that put me in mind of Tristram Shandy (black spaces, words excised from the text, multiple columns), the book tells its story by words and by form. I will certainly return to this playful and beautiful text.

Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion

In this bleak book, Joan Didion sketches the portrait of Maria Wyeth's increasingly empty and meaningless life. Set in and around Hollywood, we watch both Maria's self-destruction and her observation of the lives crumbling around her. Coming from the author of Slouching Towards Bethlehem and The White Album, though, this novel's perspective is not exactly a surprise. Didion's prose is crisp, and her instinct as to which scenes to include is sharp.

Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita

Although this novel seemed a bit too pat, too forced at times, I enjoyed reading it. Yamashita has arranged her story over the course of a week, from the perspective of seven characters, and each character has a chapter a day. Everything seems to converge, or almost to converge at the end, and while she doesn't tie everything entirely up, there were moments when I felt like the deck was stacked against the reader. Otherwise, I enjoyed following angels, oranges, and maps across the apocalyptic landscape of Los Angeles (almost a character in its own right).