Classic Corner Best of The Best

 Classic Corner Best of The Best

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

What a year!

This has been a hellacious year for everyone. I believe that what has kept me going this year are the amount of wonderful books that I read and reviewed.

Of course, I am doing my annual favorite books of 2020 list. This year, I am doing things a bit differently. I am combing New Book Alert and Weekly Reader into one list and have a separate one for Classics Corner. As always, I have enjoyed the journeys that these books have taken me on and look forward to more journeys in the future.

10. Heartburn by Nora Ephron

Academy Award nominated screenwriter, Nora Ephron penned this sharp, witty, and biting semi-autobiographical novel of the decline of a marriage. Ephron's wit finds its target in divorce, dating, psychology, and food as her fictional counterpart cookbook author, Rachel Samstadt, tries to live her life without her narcissistic soon to be ex-husband, Mark. This is a delicious book with plenty of juicy one liners and tasty recipes meant to wet the Readers' appetites.

9.The Trial by Franz Kafka

Kafka's Existential nightmare is a terrifying satire of the Justice system, one which dehumanizes and destroys the people caught up inside. Joseph K. is arrested for unknown reasons and made to stand trial in what would be an insult to refer to as a kangaroo court. There are various moments such as Josef being unable to find specific rooms or never meeting the judge face to face that reveals the bureaucratic nightmare in which he is trapped.

8.Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Vonnegut's postmodern experimental narrative is a memorable novel about WWII veteran, Billy Pilgrim becoming unstuck in time following the trajectory of his youth, marriage, military career, and time on the planet Trafalmadore, out of order. Vonnegut's savage writing portrays the cruelty of war exemplified during the Bombing of Dresden. It also illustrates the fatalistic nature of one who lives all of his memories at once and can do nothing to change them. 

7.Hiroshima by John Hersey

Hersey's nonfiction account of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima, Japan would force anyone to become an anti-war activist. Hersey wrote of the attack and aftermath from the points of view of six citizens from Mrs. Hatsuyo Nakamura, a single mother of three, to Dr. Terefumi Sasaki,a Red Cross surgeon. Hersey's description is heart wrenching in describing the physical and emotional toll that the people suffered for a long time afterwards. It brings human faces to the people that the Allied forces saw at the time as "the Enemy."

6.The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers

McCullers' debut novel is an insightful look at loneliness and the toll it takes on people. John  Singer, a deaf-mute appears in a small town after being separated from his only friend and companion. He attracts the interest of four locals who confide their troubles to this strange newcomer because he can't hear or judge them. The four people are isolated because of their race, sex, political views, and inner turmoil. When a loss occurs, the characters feel lonelier and more isolated than ever, showing how hard it is to find connections in a cold disinterested world.

5.A People's History of The United States by Howard Zinn

The strongest and most eye opening account of American history covers from Columbus' takeover of the Arawak nation to the beginnings of the War on Terror. It tells of the United States through various eyes: Native Americans, African-Americans, lower class workers, women, labor union organizers, immigrants, anti war protestors, Socialists, political activists and many others who needed, wanted, and demanded to be heard and recognized. This is a story about all of us in the United States and one that we all need to read, hear, and understand.

4.One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

This book about Colombian history seen through the eyes of five generations of the Buenida Family is a confusing book to read, but it is one that is best appreciated on an emotional level. It is filled with beautiful dream like description such as a house made of mirror walls. The description and the magical realism make this book into a visual masterpiece of storytelling, one that the Reader can't easily forget.

3.The Women's Room by Marilyn French

French's novel takes the Readers through the Second Wave of Feminism from the conformist 1950's, to the Feminine Mystique 1960's, to the activist 1970's seen through the eyes of Mira Ward, a wife and mother later to become a divorcee and college student. Mira recounts the troubles she and other suburban housewives have when they are unfulfilled by lives of home, husband, and children. Then she becomes involved in activism and the women's movement documenting that change by capturing the deep characters that surround her and themes of finding one's own independence.

2.The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

This moving novel recounts the lives of four women who emigrated from China and their daughters who were raised in America. The stories are told in alternating points of view as each generation learns of the struggles that they are going through and use their own lessons to educate one another. The book turns the characters not just into mothers and daughters but into women who finally understand each other.

 1.The Neverending Story by Michael Ende

Of the books that I have read this year, this one has stayed with me the longest. Bastian Balthazar Bux, a shy bookish boy is thrust into the magical world of Fantastica and encounters a bevy of fantasy creatures and adventures. The adventures capture the imagination and escapism through reading. However, the real theme of true heroism lies when Bastian finds the courage within himself and his own identity. This has been a book that has stayed through several generations and deservedly so. It is a fantastic masterpiece.

Honorable Mention: Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery, The Collected Stories of Franz Kafka by Franz Kafka, Mary Queen of Scotland and The Isles by Margaret George, The Nancy Drew Mysteries 1-10 by Carolyn Keene, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbooks Got Wrong by Jeff Loewens, Spite Fences by Trudy Krisher, Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Gracia Marquez, and The Writer's Elements of Style by William H. Strunk Jr.