BOTY 2017 thread

Got em!

...

The only people who care are those in the industry. Look close and you might discover you are in the industry or wish to be.

Most of this year's Best Sellers weren't even published this year. Go to Amazon charts and flip back through the months. T. Public Reader cares fuckall about your Contempo-Lit: Potter, Handmaids Tale, It, American Gods--Hollywood reboot nonsense books.

So you can fuck right off with your elitist back patting award show mentality. There is no future. Time to finish your backlog.

>best sellers
I could expect as much from a diehard Veeky Forums defender. Your argument is essentially
>all the popular books are trash!
Wow, a real zinger, a real important piece of wisdom. OR, it's a complete red herring because you have nothing to say and basically admit that you don't read anything new, because you've already decided that "there is no future."

Hint: no one actually asked for "award show" books. OP asked for "favorite books." And I'm asking for contemporary stuff. You just wanna fight your autistic fight because the world needs more of your jaded, pithy opinions.

I always feel bad around November for not reading anything published this year so that I can participate in these threads, but there's so little time and so much I want to read. Perhaps when I'm 40 I will start to read more contemporary lit so I can be a guide to the rest of you.

How the fuck am I supposed to have a favorite contemporary book? I've got over 2,600 years worth of literature to work through over here. In ten or twenty years the wheat will be separated from the chaff and I'll have a go at it.

two "t"s my dude? Tur Tles? The Turtles? esplain pls

>You didn't deny you want to be part of industry. Shill.

You thought people would take this seriously. Wow.

Give me some contemporary authors on the level of Tolstoy, Proust, Musil, Shakespeare, Milton, Dante, Browning, Pound, Melville, Aeschylus or Homer. All those figures weren't just skilled either, they were the culmination of specific cultures and eras. Name a few contemporary authors in that vein, otherwise I'm spending my time reading lesser work.

This mentality is the domain of newfags as well as bitter old men. This idea that all literature is basically cut from the same cloth, and that the older works are therefore more valuable by virtue of having been curated, selected, and built upon by ages of criticism. But literature is a living thing. And contemporary literature will always speak to the current zeitgeist the way the classics simply can't. I'm not denying the power of the classics. Certain stories are universal. Certain feelings are universal. Borges says, referring to the 4 gospels, "perhaps we only need a few stories." But I see contemporary lit as categorically different; it is alive, exploratory, and bound to stumble. It articulates new feelings at the risk of sounding rebellious, disorderly, and even unintelligible. That's a trade I'm willing to make. I can say that while still reading Shakespeare, Whitman, or Chaucer.

Pic related is my favorite recent book (2016), though it doesn't count for the purpose of this thread.
>inb4 women memes
>inb4 shitskin memes
just dont

"But lowercase letters are cuter."
Darcie Wilder
Contemporary Writer

>anyone who calls me out is obviously working with the jews / overlords
would it make you feel better if i was? does that legitimize your bitter outsider perspective?

>Contemporary colored female
Not a good start user. Also this
> that the older works are therefore more valuable by virtue of having been curated, selected, and built upon by ages of criticism
Is not the thinking at all. But I like the idea of
>contemporary literature will always speak to the current zeitgeist the way the classics simply can't.
The only problem is I have yet to find decent literature that actually does that. Internet, urban isolation, superficiality of new media; all themes I'd love to read, there is a lot of room for good satire and commentary. I just haven't found any, other than Houellebecq

Nabokov, Beckett, Neruda, Borges

Read whoever you want, I don't care. This thread isn't for you. This thread is for people who read "lesser work" and want to exchange recs. I'm sure you can go piss on a Rand thread or a Sci-fi general, if that's how you get off.

>>all the popular books are trash!
This is actually true in our current program era. At the moment, the artistic class is far too homogenized to produce anything of worth.

Gerald Murnane has been compared to Beckett and Proust and is considered one of Australia's best chances at winning a Nobel Prize in Lit. His latest and final novel came out this year.

contemporary means still living, you dork

Tell me your thinking wasn't influenced by end of year my-teamism.
WTF asshole? I read Classics this year just to prove to myself that they are mostly marketing nonsense. You have gone after the wrong person.
If the public won't read new stuff why would the generally stuffed shirts that are lit?
Done with you. You are just tossing spaghetti and hoping I bite. If your weirdo book has merit then it needs no defense.
I just checked her Twitter. She's an ass. Good luck, user.

I honestly don't give a shit if a book "speaks to the current zeitgeist." I'm only interested in literary merit. I don't care if you have a really neat perspective, if you can't write I'm not fucking interested.

I don't read contemporary literature because it hasn't passed the test of time. Any idiot can pay to get his book published, as we can see in the OP. But you can't pay for your book to be remembered 100 years from now.

Contemporary is post-WW2, and living as a qualifier doesn't make sense. If an author published a work today then dies tomorrow, then it's no longer contemporary? Think, man.

pls refer to
and take your "stop liking what i don't like" elsewhere

You're an idiot, look up what contemporary means, try and remember it. Embarrassing that you haven't already

muh man
was gonna buy myself Border Districts for Xmas - so you recommend?

calm down, no one's going after anyone. I'm not OP and you don't make a lot of sense right now

Tbh I haven't read it yet, but I did buy a copy just the other week. So it's next up I reckon. But Murnane's a legend, so I doubt he'd fuck it up. As far as I know he's been working on this one for about 3 or so years.

This is a shit thread. Man I ate that b8.

quality post, keep up the great work

quality post, keep up the great work

You don't make the rules here, I can post wherever I want.

Is this real? Is this from an actual book? Is it self-published? Is OP defending this? Are my eyes real? Can I poke them out now?

thanks for the rec, i'll look into it

It's real, including the typos and lack of punctuation. Those are the first four paragraphs, I believe.

speaking to the current zeitgeist and having literary merit aren't even a little bit at odds. it's your prerogative if you don't want to take chances with your reading but "I'm only interested in literary merit" is generally a sentiment expressed by people who don't read a whole lot but like being perceived as intellectual. spending a few hours with a book written by someone who's still alive won't preclude you from exploring the canon thoroughly

@ OP my personal favorite is probably "The Answers" by Catherine Lacey thus far but I expect "Pachinko" is going to clean up awards-wise

>Contemporary is post-WW2,

lol maybe in the 70s

Define contemporary literature then, goat.

>Veeky Forums throws a hissy fit when asked about literature outside le epic western canon

o i am laffin

Five tried, five died, most of them were women and non-whites. 2017 was a forgettable year in print. Upon grievous consideration, I must side with user in declaring "literally show me a healthy person: OK" book of the year, Congratulations Darcie Wilder.

I always thought about writing a book where when the characters became emotional, upset, unhinged in the story, shitty grammar would extend past dialogue into the prose itself

someone else itt already did and u r retard for not checking up on that

Joyce already did it

I was imagining my story actually making sense and somewhat readable

>Hint: no one actually asked for "award show" books. OP asked for "favorite books." And I'm asking for contemporary stuff.
Hint: the Title of this thread is Book of the Year 2017 Thread.
>You just wanna fight your autistic fight because the world needs more of your jaded, pithy opinions.
At least I know what BOTY stands for, genius.

Muh-ah-ha HA!

I haven't read anything published in 2017, OP. What are some books you would recommend?

Oh, I see this is all bait... The classics are very worthwhile and to dismiss them just as a meme is kinda foolish, user. Please reconsider.

has anybody read lincoln in the bardo? i'm planning on starting it in a lil while

i'm almost through it and i love it. it's very special

Who the fuck reads vanity publishers, dude? It's for bored middle-aged or retired people to say they "published" something

The problem is the pure mass of pulp out there and its extremely hard to distinguish anything of worth between what are vanity publishes or simply mouth pieces for the liberal middle class women in charge of publishing

pic related

It's like pp. for pages. Stems from Latin to duplicate the letter in order to express plurality, but you wouldn't know that.

>I don't have any opinions of my own

...

...

This is a self contradictory position.

>But you can't pay for your book to be remembered 100 years from now.
its called marketing....

Darcie's great. Just picked up this gem. Not to distract from this thread -- genuinely cool to have a Veeky Forums thread on current books -- but anyone else following the drama between her and Tyrant Books (her publisher)?

yeah, the dude lost his dang marbles. americans seem a bit obsessed with literary agents though, maybe it's the free market and all

I don't get this hatred of contemporary literature. What is wrong with postmodernism?

I mean I think it's admirable to create a venue that bypasses the typical system used by 98% of all publishers. It also helps to not price the writers out etc.

That being said guy's being a massive cock toward writers he's published, like playground insults

the diaperlords bleating about >muh sacred canon in this thread are pretty much the literary equivalent of rockists. they have no real interest in literature, pay them no mind

Is there anything more middlebrow than reading contemporary literature?

Why has no one realised that that's that pornstar turned writer, Danny Wylde.

yes, being this much of an inscure faggot:

Lol, "chthonic"
thebelfry.rip/blog/2015/12/11/chthonic-intuition-gothropology

pull up "gothropology", jamie.

yeah its not reading philosophy

I read some recent stuff, but too much of it is wrapped-up in contemporary things that will go stale within a couple of years. It isn't built to last.

I've been putting off reading Perdido Street Station for like 5 years

patrick white already won the gold for australia user

yeah, posting on /////Veeky Forums///////

Umberto Eco died last year so he isn't contemporary anymore?

I read about fifty books a year you condescending prick.

I read plenty of non-canonical books.

I just don't particularly care what some recent MFA graduate thinks about the world.

If the publishing industry was more diverse (i.e. male) I might have more interest in contemporary literature.

...

...

...

I bought this but haven't started it yet.

It's a fun fantasy romp so far. Audiobook is alright