1999 book challenge

[Charles]

In 1999 I tried to answer the question "Are there fewer good books now?" by reading through the NY Times notable book list for that year. There were 144 novels, including SF and crime (about 7% of production), of which I identified 7 "keepers." Ten years on, the vote:
4.31 Peter Dickinson, Some Deaths Before Dying
4.27 Nina Berberova, The Book Of Happiness
3.47 Aharon Appelfeld, The Conversion
3.34 Iam McEwan, Amsterdam
3.20 John Rolfe Gardiner, Somewhere In France
2.87 Daniel Wallace, Ray In Reverse
0.00 Ella Leffland, Breath and Shadows
Not counting McEwan, the average number of ratings is 32 the average number of reviews is 4.5

THE CHALLENGE: Did I get it right?

From 2009, what are the books from 10 years ago that we still read? Is an average rating of 3.65 good? Mediocre?

[Wes, Moderator]

Charles wrote: "In 1999 I tried to answer the question "Are there fewer good books now?" by reading through the NY Times notable book list for that year. There were 144 novels, including SF and crime (about 7% of ..."

What are you talking about?

[Charles]

Well, Wes, I don't know what to say. Ten years ago I looked through 144 notable novels for that year (1999) and identified seven which I thought might last. Now, ten years on, how do my choices look? Dumb? Prescient? Would anyone care to suggest novels from 1999 that we're still reading? [Incidentally, I concluded that seven good books a year was about the average -- implying 137 not so notable novels that year and about 1700 doomed to sink like a hammer in the lake, as Tom Waits has it. So the 20th century chalked up about 700 good reads, 12,000 or so well-reviewed but now forgotten novels, and about 170,000 "others." No comment.:]

[Wes, Moderator]

Interesting