In the spirit of year-end lists, and for my own future reference, here are the books I read for the first time this year. Most of them, anyway – I didn’t keep a running list and my memory is imperfect. Also: Just primary literature, no scholarship (too many, too complicated, too fragmented).

• John Barth, Giles Goat-Boy
• Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves
• Junot Díaz, Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
• Dave Eggers, What Is the What?
• Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
• Rivka Galchen, Atmospheric Disturbances
• Dagoberto Gilb, The Last Known Residence of Mickey Acuña
• Ivan Goncharov, Oblomov
• Jonathan Littell, The Kindly Ones
• David Markson, The Last Novel
• Nick Monfort, Book and Volume
• Marisha Pessl, Special Topics in Calamity Physics
• Kim Stanley Robinson, Red Mars
• Emily Short, Bronze
• Uzodinma Iweala, Beasts of No Nation
• Richard Yates, Revolutionary Road

Picked up and put down Sacred Games, a couple of Jonatham Lethem novels, Let the Great World Spin, and some other things I’m sure I’ve forgotten. Will update as I remember more.

First up in 2010: The Interrogative Mood.