Vote for MobileRead's best fiction book of 1901-1910

[pdurrant]

Well, I now have Before Adam, Adam & Eve diaries, Riddles of the Sands, The Virginian, The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl, and Anne of Green Gables on my eReader. We shall see how I do.

[Greg Anos]

My concern is that how many people are going to vote for other than their own nomination. (Atfer all, if they nominated is as the best, why would they vote for some other book?)

[AnotherCat]

Of the around half of the nominated titles that I've read (some long ago now) a few stand out for me, those being "The Call of the Wild" and "Nostromo", and to throw in something a bit easier and more fun then Ratty and Co.'s adventures. I haven't read "The Virginian" (as far as I recall) but has been close to the top of my "to read" list for some time, so its nomination has prompted me to move it up a bit more on that (thanks).

Although I have been a keen sailor all my life (but maybe because of that?) I found that "The Riddle of the Sands" was quite a mission to maintain interest in and get through; that being the only nomination I am indifferent about.

Oh, and am not saying which I will vote for (if any) .

[mandy314]

Now with voting under way and everlod not yet having "explained" his nomination, some thoughts about "Nostromo", the book I voted for, from my pov.

Conrad tells us a tall tale. It is a rich adventure with all the ingredients: South America, wealth and deprivation, political irrationality, economic rationality, revolution, love interest, tragedy all around.

Fully titled "Nostromo, A Tale of the Seaboard" the novel could well be named "The Rise and Fall of Nostromo". Nostromo is an individual who makes things happen, makes history even. And not from a position of power and/or wealth, but based upon his charisma, his mental and physical strength, the respect and trust of his peers.

There are other strong characters in the book - for instance Martin Decoud or the Viola family. But Nostromo stands head and shoulder above them all. For me he isn't a character to like. Not in the first part of the tale when he does the "right" things like a superhero, and not in the second part when he manufactures his own downfall mainly out of an understandable feeling of entitlement.

It all ends in tears.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Well, I now have Before Adam, Adam & Eve diaries, Riddles of the Sands, The Virginian, The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl, and Anne of Green Gables on my eReader. We shall see how I do.

All IMO, of course: The Adam and Eve diaries were fun, but nowhere near the best in this list. Anne of Green Gables is better, and I'm going to finish the book now I've started it, but it doesn't (yet!) beat my nomination.

[AnotherCat]

Further to Mandy314's comments, with which I concur, another thing that impresses me about Conrad's books (including Nostromo, of course) is the beautiful clear prose with no sense of pretentiousness or of having been over worked.

English was Conrad's second language and he did not learn that until he was an adult; I've often wondered if that is what has contributed to his clear and clean writing.

John

[LovesMacs]

I'm not voting in this and this is why: polls like this remind me just how much I haven't yet read.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Well, I now have Before Adam, Adam & Eve diaries, Riddles of the Sands, The Virginian, The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl, and Anne of Green Gables on my eReader. We shall see how I do.

Anne of Green Gables was indeed a very good book. I still prefer my own nomination, Kim, but I'm glad to have read AoGG at last.

I'm currently reading Before Adam which is interesting, especially for the matter-of-fact acceptance of human evolution less than 40 years after the publication of The Descent of Man, but (half way through) doesn't have the depth of feeling of Kim or AoGG.

[pdurrant]

[Admin note: The discussion of whether the poll should be anonymous or not has been moved to its own thread.]

[sun surfer]

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James is a marvellous and beautiful book that I love. However, it is not an easy one, even by James standards. It is one of his longest novels and perhaps even the longest, it is dense and subtle, oblique and evasive, it features some unusually nefarious main characters for James as well as fragility and innocence attacked, and it is heartbreaking. It is one of his late-period masterpieces and some say one of his best and perhaps even the best.

Milly Theale, a naive young American heiress, travels to London and soon becomes friends with Kate Croy. Kate is secretly engaged to Merton Densher, whom Milly happens to have a crush on, but Kate and Densher both have very little money. Kate discovers that Milly is somewhat sick, very possibly with an incurable and deadly disease, and concocts a devious plan - to have Milly fall in love with and marry Densher and have him inherit Milly's money when she dies in the presumably not-too-distant future, at which point he and Kate can then marry and be rich - and so pushes Densher to be especially caring towards Milly. Milly is quite unsuspecting, and unselfish as well, wanting to make others happy despite her own illness. Milly takes a sojourn to Venice - she thinks it a nice place to possibly die - and the others follow along, where Densher learns Kate's full plan and is torn about it, while Milly is falling for him and becoming sicker.

[Rizla]

Hound of the Baskervilles. Easily the single biggest influence out of all those books.

[bfisher]

"The Riddle of the Sands" by Erskine Childers introduced the modern spy thriller genre.

More details here, SPOILER ALERT; it includes a plot summary
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Riddle_of_the_Sands

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by Rizla

Hound of the Baskervilles. Easily the single biggest influence out of all those books.

Rizla, A Study in Scarlet was published in 1887, 15 years before Baskervilles.

I wonder why you think that Baskervilles was particularly influential.

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by bfisher

"The Riddle of the Sands" by Erskine Childers introduced the modern spy thriller genre.

More details here, SPOILER ALERT; it includes a plot summary
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Riddle_of_the_Sands

bf, I'm planning to read Riddle soon. But when The 39 Steps was the book club's selection, it was discussed as if it was the first modern spy thriller. Are you confident that Riddle rather than 39 Steps was the one?

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by issybird

Not surprisingly, I think my nomination, The Golden Bowl, surpasses the others, especially for the quality of its prose. I think the story has more heft than the other Jamesian nomination, The Wings of the Dove.

Originally Posted by sun surfer

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James is a marvellous and beautiful book that I love. However, it is not an easy one, even by James standards. It is one of his longest novels and perhaps even the longest, it is dense and subtle, oblique and evasive, it features some unusually nefarious main characters for James as well as fragility and innocence attacked, and it is heartbreaking. It is one of his late-period masterpieces and some say one of his best and perhaps even the best.

I got 50 pages into The Golden Bowl and then 30 pages into The Wings of the Dove. I really don't like the way James tells us (in great detail) what his characters are like, and I also don't like his prose style of long elaborate sentences. Not for me at all.

So, I've now read 12 of the 19. Enough. There are more decades to catch up on! Time for me to vote, and yes, I'm sticking with my nomination, Kim. Anne of Green Gables is close, but for me it doesn't have the taste of the exotic or the excitement that Kim has.