The best books of 2009

NICHOLAS REID

Limestone by Fiona Farrell (Random House)

A beautifully crafted novel by one of New Zealand's most underrated talents. A reconciliation of childhood and adulthood, art and reality, told with tremendous subtlety.

Brixton Beach by Roma Tearne (HarperCollins)

In telling the story of racial and cultural tensions (Tamil and Sinhalese on Sri Lanka), an expatriate novelist avoids the pitfalls of preachiness and shows us how much the personal is political.

Somebody Loves Us All by Damien Wilkins (VUP)

The New Zealand novel of the year and Wilkins' best work so far. A story about language, motherhood and the relationship of adult children with their parents, including a brilliant deployment of the story-within-the-story.

Encircled Lands – Te Urewera 1820-1921 by Judith Binney (Bridget Williams Books)

The New Zealand non-fiction of the year. A scholarly book and by no means an easy read, but ultimately a devastating account of how the Tuhoe people were done out of their land by their colonial masters.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez – A Life by Gerard Martin (Bloomsbury)

This blockbuster biography of the South American literary lion doesn't quite separate biography from fan-worship but is still as comprehensive as we will get before Garcia Marquez is in the grave.

(Turkey Of The Year? No surprises. Even without considering the plagiarism issue, Witi Ihimaera's The Trowenna Sea served up cardboard characters and current cliches as if they were insights into history and had no real feel for the past whatsoever. How did a book so bad get published?)

Nicholas Reid is an Auckland historian and reviewer.

CLARE MCINTOSH

Look Who's Morphing by Tom Cho (Giramondo)

Stories of transformation "narrated" by the main characters of trash movies, comics, video games, etc. Begins with "Baby" from Dirty Dancing and literally climaxes with Gulliver cum Godzilla.

Singularity by Charlotte Grimshaw (Vintage)

Grimshaw synthesises another serving of narrative protein from the DNA of her award-winning collection, Opportunity. Literary loaves and fishes – the miracle of a genius.

As the Earth Turns Silver by Alison Wong (Penguin)

Poet novelist Wong deploys artful pacing, characterisation and use of the unsaid. Recalibrate your heart with The English Patient of Wellington's World War One Chinatown.

Through the Door by Jo Randerson and Seraphine Pick (Wedge)

You could read this every night and still not work out which door's marked "entry" and which "exit". Watch: Randerson's Rabbit-Pony will soon be available as a pet sidekick in World of Warcraft.

(Since I would have also included Somebody Loves Us All by

Damien Wilkins):

Death of a (Sub)Editor by C Daniell McIntosh (Old Testament).

Part revenge story, part thriller – McIntosh demonstrates that the pen is as mighty as the sword, and that those who live by it, will die by it.

Clare McIntosh is a Wellington editor and a 2009 Montana NZ Book Awards reviewer of the year finalist.

STEVE WALKER

Rhyming Life and Death by Amos Oz (Houghton Mifflin)

Oz's farewell to the novel? A beguiling meditation on life and the art of fiction.

The Rehearsal by Eleanor Catton (VUP)

Properly from last year, but nevertheless a stunning debut by a new NZ writer. Intertwining performances in an exploration of fictionality.

Lovesong by Alex Miller (Allen & Unwin)

Longing on a number of levels. A clear, profound and beautiful love story.

Brooklyn by Colm Toibin (Scribner)

Emigrants' stories told in Toibin's plain yet darkly humorous style. Depth and beauty combined.

Love and Summer by William Trevor (Penguin)

An elegy on love and escape, sumptuously told in Trevor's trademark subtlety.

Steve Walker is head of English at King's College in Auckland.

HELEN WATSON WHITE

This year I was struck – instantly – by Red Studio: Forty-five Prints (Longacre) by Dunedin artist John Z Robinson, whose pint-sized linocuts – like his paintings and jewellery – always punch beyond their weight.

Even more explosive in its combination of wit and craft was Wild Nights! by Joyce Carol Oates (Ecco). Stories about the last days of Poe, Dickinson, Twain, James and Hemingway, which American author Oates has brought forth at what seems the peak of a stellar career. In no less than her 21st story collection since 1963, she takes you where no other fiction-writer has ever been.

Huia Short Stories 8 (Huia) takes you places, too. Its long list of contributors, diverse in age, occupation, experience, contained quite a few names I'll seek out again.

Finally, I enjoyed seeing life since 1980 through Fiona Kidman's eyes, in Beside the Dark Pool: A Memoir (Vintage).

And the decades since the 1950s through the lens of Marti Friedlander, in Leonard Bell's stunning hardback volume of her photographs, Marti Friedlander (AUP), with insightful essays.

Helen Watson White is a Dunedin writer and photographer, and was a reviewer of the year finalist at the 2009 Montana NZ Book Awards.

CHERYL SOUCHER

Strength In What Remains by Tracy Kidder (Random House)

With simplicity and passion, Kidder recreates the astonishing journey of a young African medical student named Deogratias who escapes the violence of his native Burundi only to accidentally land in New York City, make friends and get an education, before eventually returning home to realise his dream.

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (Penguin)

Kitteridge, a primary school teacher who strikes terror in the hearts of her weakest students, is the focus of this fictional jewel box of linked stories. Strout writes with unflinching clarity and mesmerising beauty of life's minor disappointments and the courage born out of simple dignity.

The Forever War by Dexter Filkins (Jonathan Cape)

Filkins' sensitive and hair-raising reporting of the fighting on the front lines of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will stop time and take your breath away. This is what reporting should be all about.

The Commoner by John Burnham Schwartz (Vintage)

A gorgeous novel that reads like a beautiful bamboo brushstroke. Schwartz courageously evokes the pathos and beauty of Haruko who in 1959 became the first commoner to marry the Crown Prince of Japan.

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel (HarperCollins)

In this deservedly popular 2009 Man Booker Prize selection, Mantel skillfully imagines the web of intrigue bleeding through Henry VIII's court during the years when he conspired to annul his marriage to Katherine of Aragon and wed the cunningly brilliant Anne Boleyn.

Cheryl Soucher is a reviewer living in New York.

STEPHEN LONG

Tender by Nigel Slater (HarperCollins)

Quite simply the most inspiring book of the year. Four years in the writing and an utter joy to read, Tender is a book about vegetables written for meat-lovers. Sidekick transformed into Superhero. Passionately written and beautifully photographed, and the sequel will be much awaited.

Moorish by Greg and Lucy Malouf (Hardie Grant)

Reprint of the 2001 classic which modernised the food of the Moors and reintroduced it as a serious restaurant cuisine.

Go Fish by Al Brown (Random House) and Sean Armstrong's Kitchen by Sean Armstrong (Random House)

These are my third-equal cookbooks. Two New Zealand chefs who have produced great books with delicious and attainable recipes.

Seasons by Donna Hay (HarperCollins)

Bound to sell in billions, Donna Hay is as influential now as Delia Smith was in the 70s and 80s. There is nothing ground-breaking in this book, but it is beautiful to look at, contains hundreds of recipes which work and is the definition of modern-casual style.

Stephen Long is an Auckland chef and food consultant.

AND DON'T FORGET ...

FICTION

Summertime by JM Coetzee (Random House)

A dazzling, dark, funny, startling masterpiece.

Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger (Random House)

Powerful, well-plotted gothic novel from the author of The Time Traveler's Wife (made into an average film).

The Death of Bunny Munro by Nick Cave (Text).

Cave's uncompromising second novel, about a sex-obsessed salesman, is sharp, smart and funny as hell.

The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood (Allen & Unwin)

Extraordinary futuristic lament for the human race.

Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro (Random House).

One of the grandees of English-language short fiction produces another densely packed, effortless-seeming collection of stories.

The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (Text)

Prequel to The Shadow of the Wind with most of that beloved novel's strengths – plot, character, Barcelona.

Fifty Ways to Find a Lover by Lucy-Ann Holmes (Pan)

Blog reborn, with snappy dialogue and a warm, wicked sense of humour.

Knotted by Michelle Holman (HarperCollins)

It's by a Kiwi, it's her third hit in a row, and although it starts out in Auckland it ends up at Oscars night. Gold.

The 10pm Question by Kate De Goldi (Longacre)

A bittersweet tale of families, friendship and love that neatly crosses the boundaries between teen and adult fiction.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo/The Girl Who Played with Fire/The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Steig Larsson (Quercus/Maclehose).

This Swedish crime phenomenon deserves its success, being smartly written with a complex, high-IQ heroine and a ferocious level of plot detail.

Hardball by Sara Paretsky (Hachette)

In a plot that never misses a beat, VI Warshaski finds herself caught up in an action-packed hunt for a missing person that digs up old feuds, racial hatred and dodgy politicians.

EVERYTHING ELSE

Eating the Sun by Oliver Morton (Fourth Estate).

Lucid, fulsome primer on the evolutionary miracle of how plants do their stuff.

The Greatest Show on Earth (Random House).

Sadly necessary, a forceful demonstration of the overwhelming evidence for evolution.

Dick Frizzell – The Painter (Random House)

You could have a dozen books on Frizzell, but you'd still need this joyous art book.

No Other Home Than This by John Andrews (Craig Potton)

New history of European New Zealanders redefines Pakeha sense of place.

James K Baxter: Poems as selected and introduced by Sam Hunt (AUP).

The Bard of Kaipara chooses a collection from his friend and mentor of poems "you can't forget".

Just This by Brian Turner (VUP)

Landscape as character, dramatic and national, Central Otago as lofty, persuasive hero.

Organic Vegetable Gardening by Xanthe White (Godwit)

Eco-cool addition to an aspiring gardener's library.

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