We spend plenty of time here on The Millions telling all of you what we’ve been reading, but we are also quite interested in hearing about what you’ve been reading. By looking at our Amazon stats, we can see what books Millions readers have been buying, and we decided it would be fun to use those stats to find out what books have been most popular with our readers in recent months. Below you’ll find our Millions Top Ten list for March.
This Month
Last Month
Title
On List
1.
1.
Norwegian by Night
4 months
2.
3.
Lincoln in the Bardo
2 months
3.
2.
The Trespasser
6 months
4.
4.
Moonglow
5 months
5.
8.
A Separation
2 months
6.
5.
The North Water
4 months
7.
6.
Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living
2 months
8.
10.
Homesick for Another World
3 months
9.
7.
Commonwealth
6 months
10.
–
Swing Time
2 months
News broke recently that Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad will be adapted for the screen by Moonlight director Barry Jenkins, and it’s hard to say what Whitehead’s going to celebrate more: that wonderful development, or the fact that his novel, after a six-month run on our Top Ten list, has at last graduated to our site’s hallowed Hall of Fame. Regardless, it can be said that good news seldom comes alone.
Filling the open spot on our list is Zadie Smith, whose latest novel, Swing Time, returns to our list after a three-month absence. (It first cracked the rankings in December.) At this pace, look for Smith, who’s previously reached our Hall of Fame four years ago with NW, to send her second work there in March 2018.
Elsewhere on the list, several titles swapped positions, and George Saunders’s Lincoln In the Bardo overtook Tana French’s The Trespasser to claim second place. On our site this week, Millions staffer Jacob Lambert penned a simultaneously hysterical and haunting “modern” adaptation of Saunders’s first novel, featuring a lumbering, slovenly beast by now familiar to us all:
Even in the gloom, his skin held an unhealthy rusty glow; his hair, if one might call it that, had an aspect of spun sugar, though it did not appetize.
Meanwhile, Manjula Martin’s Scratch anthology – which chronicles the ways writers do and do not make money from their craft — held fast in the middle of our list. Millions editor Lydia Kiesling caught up with Martin last week to discuss the way the book came to be, the struggles of trying to make a living from writing, and how writers, editors, and publishers alike feel about the same:
On the one hand I’m like yeah, people who do work should be paid. On the other hand…there is a way in which artistic value cannot be quantified. These two things can be true at the same time. But I think where things become far less ambivalent is when it comes to writing for publications and companies that make a lot of money off your work while you’re not making money off your work.
Skulking just beyond our Top Ten ranks this month are two particularly notable titles: Ill Will by Dan Chaon, who was recently interviewed by Edan Lepucki; and Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing, which made it to the Championship Round of the Tournament of Books. Will either break into the rankings of our list next time? Well, there’s only one way to find out.
This month’s other near misses included: Here I Am, Version Control, and The Nix. See Also: Last month’s list.
I've been engaging with Netherland, and Zadie Smith's NYRB article on same here:
http://nigelbeale.com/2009/01/part-1-netherlandwood-smith-and-the-truly-great/
and here:
http://nigelbeale.com/2009/01/netherland-lyrical-realism-and-the-flip-flops-of-zadie-smith-part-ll/
I'm 400 pp. into 2666.
Last month I read Oscar Wao and Tree of Smoke.
Kirk, Tx.
I finished 2666 last week. I loved it.
I just started reading 2666 yesterday and so far I can't put it down. This is the second book of Bolano's I've read (the first being Amulet). I probably should have read The Savage Detectives first, but I just couldn't wait.
I've read Infinite Jest and A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, but the rest I have not.
I'm reading 2666. On the first book right now and can't put it down. So far so good. I've read most of DFW except Infinite Jest. Prefer his essays, but that's just my taste.
read Netherland (loved it, seriously considering adding it to my syllabus next semester)
read The Savage Detectives (loved the first half, alright in the middle, really liked the end) – liked it so much that I . . .
bought 2666 and it is on "The Stack"
Infinite Jest shows up on "The Stack" sometimes, but usually comes out before I get to it (though sometimes I start it before deciding I don't have time right now).
bought The Dud Avocado on recommendations here
am reading The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. about half way and would probably enjoy it more if I knew more Spanish (but I can get by). I think it might come off as heavy-handed in its "geek culture" references (for lack of a better term), but at least I haven't found more than one that I don't get immediately. if I didn't have the Spanish AND I had never spent much time with comics and hanging out in comic book shops I think I would be very lost.
I read Oscar Wao last year, and I loved it. I am not a comic book reader and have never read Lord or the Rings, but I still loved the book. As soon as I finished it, I ran out and bought Diaz's book of short stories Drown and enjoyed it very much too. I think Oscar Wao is a classic in the making.
I'm about 200 pages into 2666, and the book led me on a side trip, as they always do, to the book by journalist Teresa Rodriguez, "The Daughters of Juarez" A true story of serial murder south of the border."
I'm reading 2666 now, savouring it slowly. It is my first venture into Bolano, it has been very interesting this far. The Savage Detectives is buried somewhere beneath the mountain of coursework.
I have had Savage Detectives and haven't gotten around to reading it but judging from all the comments here maybe I need to pick it up next. Infinite Jest is the only thing on this list I've read and the more I let it marinate the highter it moves up on my list of favorite books…
Just finished Netherland Great read. Tried infinite Jest but just could not get into it.
Read Bolano's 2666, DFW's Supposedly Fun Thing, and O'Neill's Netherland. Netherland was a bit of a disappointment after all the hype, while 2666 was simply amazing even with the hype. It's been a few months since I read 2666, and I still find anything I've read since lackluster and uninteresting. I remember enjoying a number of the essays in this collection by DFW, but I read it so long time ago that my memory can't be trusted. I, too, prefer his essays to his fiction.