《紐約時報》榜單推薦:年度十大好書(一)
BRING UP THE BOdieS
《提堂》By Hilary Mantel.
作者：希拉里·曼特爾Taking up where her previous novel, “Wolf Hall,” left off, Mantel makes the seemingly worn-out story of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn newly fascinating and suspenseful. Seen from the perspective of Henry’s chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, the ruthless maneuverings of the court move swiftly to the inevitable executions. Both this novel and its predecessor were awarded the Man Booker Prize. Might the trilogy’s forthcoming conclusion, in which Cromwell will meet his demise, score Mantel a hat trick?
作爲曼特爾2009年作品《狼廳》的續作，曼特爾在本部小說中將亨利八世與安妮·博林老掉牙的故事有趣而充滿懸疑地重新呈現了出來。小說採用亨利的首席大臣托馬斯·克倫威爾的視角，講述了宮廷殘酷的體制迅速演變至不可避免的死刑。本部小說和《狼廳》一樣，均榮獲了英國布克文學獎。曼特爾有望續寫第三部終結版，屆時克倫威爾將以死亡告終。曼特爾能否上演“帽子戲法” 呢？
BUILDING STORIES
《大樓故事》By Chris Ware.
作者：克里斯·韋爾Ware’s innovative graphic novel deepens and enriches the form by breaking it apart. Packaged in a large box like a board game, the project contains 14 “easily misplaced elements” — pamphlets, books, foldout pages — that together follow the residents of a Chicago triplex (and one anthropomorphized bee) through their ordinary lives. In doing so, it tackles universal themes including art, sex, family and existential loneliness in a way that’s simultaneously playful and profound.
韋爾以分體形式昇華並豐富了這部新穎的圖畫小說。作品是在一個類似棋盤遊戲盒子裏盛有14個“極易放錯的小玩意兒”（包括小冊子、書籍以及摺疊卡片），這些小玩意兒一起構成了一棟芝加哥大樓（類人化的蜂窩）居民的日常生活。通過這種方式，韋爾寓教於樂地闡述了藝術、性、家庭以及存在主義的孤獨等普遍主題。A HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING
《國王的全息圖》By Dave Eggers
作者：戴夫·埃格斯In an empty city in Saudi Arabia, a ¬middle-aged American businessman waits day after day to close the deal he hopes will redeem his forlorn life. Eggers, continuing the worldly outlook that informed his recent books “Zeitoun” and “What Is the What,” spins this spare story — a globalized “Death of a Salesman” — into a tightly controlled parable of America’s international standing and a riff on middle-class decline that approaches Beckett in its absurdist despair.
在沙特阿拉伯一座空城裏，一名中年美國商人日復一日等待交易結束，希望挽救他孤寂絕望的生活。在這部被譽爲“世界版《推銷員之死》”的小說中，埃格斯繼續了他在近作《澤圖恩》和《什麼是什麼》中的俗世觀，緊湊的寓言式故事折射出美國的國際處境及其中產階級的衰退，其荒誕而絕望的手法堪比貝克特。（譯註：貝克特·塞繆爾爲《等待戈多》的作者）NW
《西北》By Zadie Smith.
作者：扎迪·史密斯Smith’s piercing new novel, her first in seven years, traces the friendship of two women who grew up in a housing project in northwest London, their lives disrupted by fateful choices and the brutal efficiency of chance. The narrative edges forward in fragments, uncovering truths about identity and money and sex with incandescent language that, for all of its formal experimentation, is intimate and searingly direct.
史密斯這部新銳小說講述了倫敦西北角的一個小鎮裏一起成長的兩個女性之間的友誼。她們的生活因命運般的抉擇和殘酷的機緣而各自紛擾。史密斯用卓越的筆調以片段式敘述方式觸及了身份、金錢及性別等方面，密切又無不直白地揭示了嚴肅的課題。THE YELLOW BIRDS
《黃鳥》By Kevin Powers.
作者：凱文·鮑爾斯A veteran of the Iraq war, Powers places that conflict at the center of his impressionistic first novel, about the connected but diverging fates of two young soldiers and the trouble one of them has readjusting to life at home. Reflecting the chaos of war, the fractured narrative jumps around in time and location, but Powers anchors it with crystalline prose and a driving mystery: How did the narrator’s friend die?
作爲伊拉克戰爭的退役兵，鮑爾斯在他第一部印象小說中再現了戰爭的衝突。小說講述了兩名年輕士兵的故事，他們密切相連卻又漸行漸遠，其中一人甚至難以適應回家以後的生活。小說再現了戰爭的混亂，敘述片段化，時空交錯跳躍。不過小說行文乾淨純粹，而且鮑爾斯還留下一個引人遐思的謎團：故事敘述者的朋友究竟是怎麼死的呢？
