Best of Beyond the Bestsellers

What follows is a ranked subjective (most "best of" lists are) list of "Beyond's" Top 25. It reflects my biases towards incredible created "realities" (Dobyns, Girardi, Grudin), incredible depicted realities (Chiaventone, Kurtzweil, Pelletier), incredible literary inventiveness (Gaddis, Naumoff, Perec), wicked sense of humor (Hynes, Lennon, Russo), urban (Alexie, Everett, Pelecanos) and rural (Egolf, Witt, Woodrell) tough-edged quasi-Realism, and more--be the framework comic (Proulx) or tragic (Shreve). This was a hard list to make up; left off are "Beyond" favorites and National Book Award Winners like The Giant's House and The Stone Diaries, personal author favorites like Loren Estleman, Jamie Harrison, Carl Hiaasen and T. R. Pearson, and cult favorites like To Die For andThe Virgin Suicides. All worthy candidates, for sure. But we're not going by established literary standards here, and I'll let the books on the list speak for themselves as varied reflections of what's been "best" in fiction since 1992. REB

Wrestler's Cruel StudyNick's Trip

1. Stephen Dobyns. The Wrestler's Cruel Study (1993)

2. Percival Everett. Erasure (2002)

3. Cathie Pelletier. Weight of Winter (1992)

4. John Dufresne. Louisiana Power & Light (1994)

5. Jasper Fforde. The Fourth Bear(2006)

6. Richard Russo. Straight Man (1997)

7. Anita Shreve. Strange Fits of Passion (1992)

8. Robert Girardi. Vaporetto 13 (1998)

9. Steven Carter. Famous Writing School (2007)

10. George Pelecanos. Nick's Trip (1993)

11. Sharyn McCrumb. She Walks These Hills (1994)

12. Laurence Naumoff. Silk Hope, N. C. (1994)

13. Kathleen Cambor. The Book of Mercy (1996)

Lord of the BarnyardMoon of Bitter Cold

14. Tristan Egolf. Lord of the Barnyard (1999)

15. E. Annie Proulx. The Shipping News (1994)

16. Sherman Alexie. Indian Killer (1997)

17. Frederick Chiaventone. A Moon of Bitter Cold (2002)

18. Daniel Woodrell. Tomato Red (1999)

19. Georges Perec. A Void (1996)

20. Robert Grudin. Book (1993)

21. John Dunning. The Bookman's Wake (1995)

22. Lana Witt. Slow Dancing on Dinosaur Bones (1996)

23. James Hynes. Publish and Perish (2000)

24. Allen Kurtzweil. A Case of Curiosities (1993)

25. J. Robert Lennon. The Funnies (1999)

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