Boxer, Beetle by Ned Beauman

This book is not quite in the same league as The Teleportation Accident, but it was still a great story. It features Kevin, a collector of Nazi paraphernalia who makes most of his friends on the Internet because he suffers from trimethylaminuria. When Kevin finds a letter from Hitler to a British entomologist, he finds himself rushing to solve a seventy-five year old mystery with very real implications. The complicated plot was handled very deftly, and I thought the story, filled to the brim with flawed, unhappy characters, worked very well.

The Teleportation Accident by Ned Beaumont

This novel is exactly the sort of novel I love to read: it's witty, self-referential, aware of its own status as a novel, and a lot of fun. Egon Loeser is the painfully self-absorbed anti-hero whose world is crumbling around him (he's an artist in Berlin in the 1920s)--but he doesn't see the political dangers because of his personal problems (an inability to get his show produced or to win over the charming Adele Hitler [no relation to Adolf]). He serendipitously leaves Berlin for Los Angeles (via Paris) chasing Adele, but he doesn't have any better luck in either place either with Adele or with his show. Yet, as the novel progresses, we learn more and more about Loeser's obsession with Adriano Lavinci, an Italian set designer who died in what is known as the Teleportation Accident (one of Lavinci's sets destroyed a theater in Paris). The novel teases readers: was Lavinci a theatrical genius, or a scientist centuries ahead of his time, or a magician? I definitely want to re-read this book; it may have been my favorite entry on the 2012 Booker Long List.

The Rise of Endymion by Dan Simmons

This book concludes the Hyperion Cantos and the adventures of Raul Endymion and Aenea. I found the story really moving in places and challenging in others. There are parts that were just confusing for me: I'm still not sure I completely understand the motivations of the Techno Core, for example. But I found the story both intriguing and exciting. I think I would like to re-read all four of these books, but preferably one right after the other.

Close Quarters by William Golding

This book continues the sea journey of Edmund Talbot, a younger son of an aristocrat on his way to Australia to earn some money in hopes of eventually occupying a pocket borough back in England. The ship becomes becalmed--and in the midst of the general disaster, Edmund falls in love. Edmund is a more sympathetic character than he was in the first novel, and there's a lot of beautiful prose. I especially enjoyed Talbot's meditations on the ways that nautical metaphors have infused the English language.

Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan

I really enjoyed reading this book. It purports to set everything out on the table at the beginning: it's the memoir of a woman who found herself working for MI-5 toward the end of the Cold War, and how falling in love caused her to be fired. But, as you reach the end of the novel, a gorgeous twist shakes our confidence in the entire story. I loved the way the story meditates on lies, the truth, betrayal, and art. This book is a fine example of McEwan at his most deft.

Under My Hat: Tales from the Cauldron edited by Jonathan Strahan

I really enjoyed this collection of short stories about witches. It's worth noting that Neil Gaiman's contribution is a short poem rather than a story. I picked up the collection for the Bigfoot story by Jim Butcher (which didn't disappoint)--but I enjoyed most of the stories in the anthology (usually there's a dud or two). I particularly enjoyed both Jane Yolen's "Andersen's Witch" and Ellen Kushner's "Threefold World" which posit witchcraft as part of the reason for the creations of Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales and the Finnish epic, The Kalevala, respectively.

Borges and the Eternal Orangutans by Luis Fernando Veríssimo

I really enjoyed this book, which plays on Poe and Borges as it creates a locked-room murder mystery at an international conference on Poe, attended by Borges. The narrator, our main source of information on the murder, gives plenty of clues--both to the red herrings that abound and to the real murder--but it's up to the reader (for the most part) to figure it out. Lots of fun with symbols and numbers, too. I suspect this book might not be as entertaining for those not so into this kind of academic guessing game, but I found it a really great and entertaining book.

Let the Dead Bury Their Dead by Randall Kenan

This collection of short stories, mostly set in the fictional neighborhood of Tims Creek, North Carolina, delights with its beauty, humor, and meta-fictional commentary. The stories feature a wide range of protagonists, and gradually set out a depiction of a community with memorable characters. I particularly loved "Clarence and the Dead (and What do they tell you, Clarene? and The Dead Speak to Clarence)," "Things of This World ; or, Angels Unawares," and "Let the Dead Bury Their Dead; Being the Annotated Oral History of the Former Maroon Society called Snatchit and then Tearshirt and later the Town of Tims Creek, North Carolina [circa 1854-1985]." The stories show the magic inherent in everyday life and satirize academic attempts to interpret or explain the community.

The Island of the Day Before by Umberto Eco

This book reminds me a lot of a certain kind of witty historical fiction--the kind of thing you might read in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, for instance. It's the story of Roberto, a young nobleman who gets caught up in Parisian politics and sent to spy on developing science (here, the goal is to calculate longitude), but ends up shipwrecked on a deserted (or maybe not quite deserted) ship. The book is highly meta-fictional: the narrator is coy about how he came into possession of Roberto's papers, although fairly upfront about how much he makes up or supposes along the way. The book is a lot of fun if you're into seventeenth century scientific theories, early novels (this story can't help but remind me of Robinson Crusoe), or meta-fiction generally.

The Woman Who Died a Lot by Jasper Fforde

This book gives readers a peek at Thursday Next as an aging detective. The timeline has jumped forward (it's now something near the current time) and Spec Ops is reforming. Unfortunately Thursday is not tapped as the director of the literary detectives. The book is both deftly plotted and wickedly funny--things that seem crazy at first turn out to be essential parts of the story--and to fit in quite well. I love the way that the disbanding of the Chronoguard is handled, and the suggestions about the journey into Dark Reading Matter (all the books and ideas that have been destroyed or disappeared). This series just keeps getting better.

Communion Town by Sam Thompson

This book tells the story of an unnamed, but intricately described, city through the eyes of several of its residents. Even the person of the narration changes from chapter to chapter. The place is all that connects each story to the next--but the city changes in the eyes of each of its beholders. I really enjoyed these stories--they are entertaining in their own rights, and cross many different genres. What links them thematically is the question of what is our humanity, what links us together as people. There's a sense of the city-dwellers' fear of what lurks at night and what lurks below the surface, and I thought that part in particular was very well handled.

Alcatraz Versus the Shattered Lens by Brandon Sanderson

This book shows Alcatraz's brief tenure as the temporary monarch of Mokia, where he went to try to gain military support against an attack of Librarians. But when he meets up with his mother, he realizes that good and evil aren't quite as clear as they had already seemed. The humor still rings a little flat for me, but there's a lot of wit and a ton of literary allusions. Even though the book is advertised by Scholastic as the last in the series, Sanderson plans to write a fifth and final book at some point.

Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness

This book picks up where A Gathering of Witches left off: Matthew and Diana travel back in time to Elizabethan England to look for a manuscript known as Ashmole 782 which promises to reveal secrets about witches, vampires, and demons. Matthew was still a bit heavy handed for my tastes, but we did get to see more of Diana's power--and just as importantly--to get some explanation of why she has the powers she does. We also got a number of historical cameos, including Queen Elizabeth I, Kit Marlow (who has been both daemonized and demonized in this retelling), and, all too briefly, William Shakespeare. There was a lot of historical detail (it probably doesn't hurt that Deborah Harkness is an esteemed historian of seventeenth century England in addition to writing novels and blogging about wine), which added to the atmosphere of the piece. At times it felt like obstacles were thrown up and then almost immediately brushed away (for example, when Matthew takes Diana to his family home in France, Matthew's father Philippe insists that Matthew and Diana are not married and should not marry, but by the end of the section, less than a month later, throws them a lavish wedding). The mysteries of the Ashmole 782 only continue to grow; even though we get to see it again, the reader is left with questions instead of answers--but now it seems that the book is more an object or possession than a book. It's all setting things up for the third and final volume of the trilogy.

The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

This book fills in some of the gaps left by The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game, but it is nowhere near as complex, richly developed, or entertaining as the first two books in this remarkable series. Whereas both of the other books had surprising twists that developed the plot, this one was fairly straightforward. There weren't as many hoops to jump through. Still, I think without the first two books, it might be a difficult read all the same. I do think this volume left the door open for the fourth book in the cycle, and I think there's definitely room in the world for another rich volume, so I'll be looking for that with interest.

The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

This book is set in the same world as The Shadow of the Wind--marked especially by the Cemetery of Forgotten Books--but it is set a generation earlier. David Martín is a successful author of lurid gothic tales; many of his friends feel he is wasting his talents, but he's locked into a long-term contract with a publisher who's especially interested in only the lucrative side of his talent. An interested (and apparently rich and influential) publisher, Andreas Corelli, offers to get him out of his contract in order to sign another deal. As Martín delves into the work though, he notices disturbing similarities to the life of his old house's previous owner (a lawyer-turned-writer). Many of the twists in the story were shocking, and I loved its thorough investigation of what we give up when we sell our talents. There were great layers of moral complexity in this story.

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

This book takes the reader on a delightful journey into a gothic world: Spain in the years after the Spanish Civil War. Daniel Sempere, aged 10, is taken by his father to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books and allowed to pick one to take and to care for. His choice, The Shadow of the Wind by Julián Carax, will shape the rest of his life. The story is gothic in the best sense: it's full of creepy old houses, mistaken identities, and misunderstandings. Even if you think you have a handle on who is who, there are all sorts of twists before everything is finally sorted out. There's also a deep love of literature embedded in its plot: it's a story about how stories are told and why they move us. It's definitely the kind of book I want to read again and again.

The Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons

I really enjoyed this book, which picks up with the pilgrims on Hyperion, but also introduces a broader, realtime context to their actions. Through the dreams of another Keats cybrid, Joseph Severn (named for the real Keats's painter friend), Meina Gladstone, CEO of the Hegemony can follow the actions of the pilgrims at the Time Tombs. The pilgrims disappear and reappear as they encounter the Shrike on their own. There were some great twists--rest assured that even what you think you know, you don't! I particularly appreciated the way the book examines the hidden costs of technology. The story is chock full of literary allusions, and a great conclusion to Hyperion!

Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia by Brandon Sanderson

This book continues the story of Alcatraz Smedry and his attempt to protect the Hushlands from the evil librarians. I enjoy the humor in this book (for example the Smedry talents are all things like being able to break things, looking really ugly when you wake up, and dancing badly). In addition to the resourcefulness that these talents develop, they also give the book a light-hearted side. This story exposes treachery in Nalhalla (which we get to see for the first time) and develops some theories about how the magic system works (it seems to be cleverly plotted out). I'm looking forward to the next book.

Railsea by China Miéville

This book tells an engrossing story set in a faintly recognizable but outlandish world. Islands of what might look to us like normalcy are connected by the railsea, train lines that twist & tangle over earth too dangerous to walk on (where moles, worms, & earwigs have grown in size & become genuine dangers to humans). Technology is salvaged by some trains, others carry goods, wage war, or engage in piracy. But we're treated to a ride on a moler, which hunts the massive animals of the railsea. In part, I loved this book for its imaginative world, & in part for the conceits which seems to speak to some primitive part of humanity (you can't step on the ground, or else!). I enjoyed seeing Sham ap Sooprap grow up. But mostly I loved it because in telling its story so well, it talks back to many other great books: Moby Dick, Robinson Crusoe, & Treasure Island, to name three obvious starting places. This is the kind of fantasy that got me started reading fantasy, & it's the kind of fantasy I want to read again & again & again.

Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones

This book continues the adventures of Alcatraz Smedry, an orphan who discovers that he has supernatural powers and that the world is bigger than he knows. Again, there's a lot of meta-fictional commentary on what authors do, and why they do it. There's also a neat conception of the Library of Alexandria (not destroyed, but moved). The plot twists may be a bit contrived at points, but this series is a lot of fun.