2022 TOB Shortlist

[Amy]

Now I need to make a bracket competition thread/google doc. Watch Jason folks! he's been consistently great at predicting the match-ups since we started doing this!

[Elizabeth]

Phyllis wrote: "I know we are all wrapped up in thinking about the 2022 ToB in March. But can one of you moderator people start a thread for the 2023 ToB? I really want to say that Lemon, Yeo-Sun Kwon's 2019 novel..."

Oh, what interesting thoughts. I haven't picked it up because I've heard such mixed reviews (maybe from people who'd expected something from it that it was never meant to give...seems like a blurb issue, really.) But now I'm intrigued.

[Phyllis]

Juliana wrote: "...but I’m on the fence about System... Those who have read it, should I keep going?."

Juliana, if it is the never-ending description of people's illnesses that you are not enjoying, that does not change at any point in the book.

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

Alison wrote: "I think that the one thing we can count on is that the books with no common themes will be pitted against one another.

I'm deep in the middle of a move and my ability to concentrate on anything d..."

Oh no you left G-ville?!

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

Janet wrote: "I don't think I'm going to be a completist this year either. My concentration is shot and the ones I have read haven't exactly thrilled me. It's been a rough year, my adult son was in a rollover ac..."

Janet, that sounds like a lot, and when I've been goign through a lot, I just have to read what is comforting and/or distracting, and it's not always going to be ToB books. But the books, and us, will always be here. I hope you get to spend time with that grandbaby!

[Alison]

Jenny (Reading Envy) wrote: "Oh no you left G-ville?! ..."

I'm here until mid-February. Selling a house is wild these days, as is buying another. Hopefully, it's almost done. But I will miss this part of the US, no question about that.

[Amy]

Julian - it’s tough to find (only one of my three Libby accounts had a digital copy) but concrete is a strange and wonderful exploration of language (and hijinks) that is even more amazing considering it is translated. It honestly accomplished (for me) what Oreo didn’t quite hit right.

[Lauren]

I'm listening to The Book of Form and Emptiness right now and just started In Concrete in print last night. I don't think I'd recommend reading these at the same time. They're both pretty "out there," stretching reality (or prose) in a way I haven't seen too often. I occasionally get confused with which elements of this strangeness is from which book. I feel like they're both walking the tightrope between inventive/engaging and annoying/trying too hard. I'm keeping an open mind and am certainly enjoying some parts, but for now I have mixed feelings on these... ;)

[Bretnie]

Lauren wrote: "I'm listening to The Book of Form and Emptiness right now and just started In Concrete in print last night. I don't think I'd recommend reading these at the same tim..."

Ha, Lauren, I'm reading them at the same time too and can confirm it's confusing. But I'm almost done with In Concrete, and just started the Ozeki.

I really don't like the narrator of the Ozeki audiobook, but I'm interested in where the book is going, so going to hope Benny and Annabelle's voices get more bearable...

[Lauren]

Bretnie wrote: "Lauren wrote: "I'm listening to The Book of Form and Emptiness right now and just started In Concrete in print last night. I don't think I'd recommend reading these ..."

Yes! The voices in The Book are tough... are you also listening to it, or are those voices also annoying in print?

[Bretnie]

Lauren wrote: "Bretnie wrote: "Lauren wrote: "I'm listening to The Book of Form and Emptiness right now and just started In Concrete in print last night. I don't think I'd recommen..."

Listening to it, but if I can get a print copy from the library in time I might switch. His Annabelle voice is like a mockery of women's voices. "I'm a woman and I have to speak in a high pitched squeaky voice and math is hard and I need help with this pickle jar." Maybe that's her character, but it's driving me crazy! The irony is the print book is physically very heavy and I don't like to carry around heavy things with my weak lady arms.

[Phyllis]

Bretnie wrote: "... like a mockery of women ... irony is ... my weak lady arms."
Bretnie, you made me laugh out loud with this.

[Lauren]

Bretnie wrote: "Lauren wrote: "Bretnie wrote: "Lauren wrote: "I'm listening to The Book of Form and Emptiness right now and just started In Concrete in print last night. I don't thi..."

LOL on those "weak lady arms". ;) Yes, the print version is chunky! I'm following along at times with that and the formatting is interesting. There are different fonts for different sections, gray boxes for book excerpts, etc. I can't tell if reading the print without also listening to it at the same time would change the "voice" aspect, since some of it might come from the content as well as the higher pitch tone from the narrator.

[Kyle]

Okay, so I'm almost done with Echo Wife, half-done with When We Cease to Understand the World, and I have Our Country Friends coming in from the library. Once I'm done with those I'll probably call it a day, unless someone can really sell me on Nervous System, Copeland Cane, or In Concrete.

That's about when I'm gonna rank 'em in a list. It's almost time.

[Elizabeth]

Kyle wrote: "Okay, so I'm almost done with Echo Wife, half-done with When We Cease to Understand the World, and I have Our Country Friends coming in from the library. Once I'm done with those I'll probably call..."

I want to be persuaded to read In Concrete and Nervous System as well! I feel awful because I asked my library to buy them, and they’ve been sitting beside me on my coffee table. But after having read a chapter of each, I have no desire whatsoever to pick them up again.

[Bretnie]

Kyle wrote: "Okay, so I'm almost done with Echo Wife, half-done with When We Cease to Understand the World, and I have Our Country Friends coming in from the library. Once I'm done with those I'll probably call..."

I'm in a similar spot, midway through Ozeki and Trees, which just leaves me with No One is Talking and Beautiful World which I most likely won't read.

Kyle, the only reason I might recommend Nervous System is if you loved Optic Nerve since it had a similar feel. I DNF Copeland Cane and wished I'd DNF Concrete, so no help there.

[Matthew]

Kyle wrote: "Okay, so I'm almost done with Echo Wife, half-done with When We Cease to Understand the World, and I have Our Country Friends coming in from the library. Once I'm done with those I'll probably call..."

I had a great experience with Copeland Cane on audio. I thought it was very voicey in the best way.... timely and very well done. The other two - Nervous System and In Concrete - were okay but nothing to change your reading plans for in my opinion.

[Bob]

For me, I DNF'd Nervous System, but I absolutely loved In Concrete, I thought it was a funny, clever novel--lots of puns/wordplay and digressions that elevated an already weird story.

[Lark]

I posted my brackets on Discord! I feel...accomplished.

[Kyle]

Our Country Friends and Libertie are on sale on kindle today.

[Alison]

Kyle wrote: "Our Country Friends and Libertie are on sale on kindle today."

Thank you! The waiting list at my library for the Shteyngart was months long.

[Kyle]

Well, I've read about as much of the list as I expect to. (and that's actually more than I usually read- 15 out of 18 ain't bad!) Seeing as how the tournament is arbitrary, here's my arbitrary ranking of the TOB shortlist books I read...

The Trees
When We Cease to Understand the World
Matrix
Subdivision
No One is Talking About This
The Sentence
The Book of Form and Emptiness
The Echo Wife
All's Well
Klara and the Sun
Beautiful World
Several People are Typing
Intimacies
Our Country Friends
Libertie

I'd absolutely recommend the top 3-4 to anyone, most of them were mid-to-OK, and only the Shteyngart and Libertie were mediocre.

[Care]

I'm one who liked Intimacies. I only have The Echo Wife to read (finishing Subdivision today; Copeland likely tomorrow).

I thought Intimacies had a quiet power, reflecting on how hard it is to know anyone else, let alone yourself.

[Lauren]

Is anyone else noticing Goodreads hasn't been sharing notifications for the past five or so days? I have to go into my groups to see where posts have been made... :/

I'll follow Kyle's list with my own, even though I still have a few more shortlist books to get to. I'm currently reading The Sentence, which is a bit slower than I expected, but I think I also felt that way about The Night Watchman, which I ended up really enjoying.

So far my ranking would be:
The Trees
Intimacies
All's Well
When We Cease...
Klara and the Sun
The Book of Form...
The Matrix
No One is Talking...
The Echo Wife
Several People...
Libertie
In Concrete
Our Country Friends
Beautiful World...

[Chrissy]

I think my ranking is

Matrix
Intimacies
TBoFaE
All's Well
The Trees
The Sentence

Several People...
WWCtUtW
Echo Wife
Klara
NOITAT
Libertie

The ones above the break I really liked, the ones below were good but not great. (Subdivision is in progress, and I hope to get to Our Country Friends and In Concrete soon.)

[Bretnie]

I finished all the books I intended to read this weekend, and I'm getting excited for the tournament! I ended with Trees which will make a fascinating discussion. I'm really hoping for a Trees vs Sentence championship...

Any idea how they are doing the discussion this year with Discord? I always liked having the discussion on the same page as the commentary, but I'm guessing the discussion will happen separately on Discord?

[Kyle]

I thought the Discord was for this group/brackets, not the official tournament

[Peggy]

Yes, I'm thinking the same regarding Discord, Bretnie, and I'm bummed. I liked scrolling down to the comments and digging into them. I find Discord to be chaotic and I'm so bummed to have yet another message board to manage. Ah well.

I've only read half so far but am holding out for a Trees vs Matrix final.

[Kim]

Lauren- Yes, the same has been happening to me regarding no Goodreads notifications for a couple of days.

[Lee]

Bretnie wrote: "Any idea how they are doing the discussion this year with Discord? I always liked having the discussion on the same page as the commentary, but I'm guessing the discussion will happen separately on Discord?"

I think discussion will definitely happen on Discord but I haven’t heard anything definite about Disqus, odd as it might seem to have discussion going on two separate places. Well, three, including here. So I guess why not…

[Zachary]

I'll be so disappointed if there's not a discussion on Disqus this year. I'm not sure I can keep up with another platform in my life in 2022.

In other news, I've only got Matrix and The Book of Form and Emptiness to go, and I've enjoyed more of the list than I thought I would after getting past a couple clunkers.

[Kyle]

Also I think Discord might be frowned upon by my employer, as it is generally the method by which our students share their answers with each other/goof off from doing work - not something I want to access as a teacher. Maybe I'll get it on my phone and scroll through after hours, but I'll still be keeping an eye on the Disqus comments moreso than the Discord.

[Bretnie]

Ah, I'm not the only one unsure how this is going to work! My impression was they were wanting to get away from disqus, but it would have such a different feel if the judgments and commentary is in one spot and the discussion is in another.

[Lauren]

Bretnie wrote: "Ah, I'm not the only one unsure how this is going to work! My impression was they were wanting to get away from disqus, but it would have such a different feel if the judgments and commentary is in..."

Yes, I'm guessing each judgment will be posted in a channel in discord, and we can comment on it from there. I'm also not wild about the change. While Disqus wasn't perfect, I struggle with adding new platforms as well. I've had discord open as a tab for both this and one of my writing communities, but I'm not able to keep up with it. I use slack a ton for work and other spaces, and being used to that makes the formatting of discord a little confusing (especially the threading part). I'm guessing they'll switch back next year if it doesn't go well on discord this year.

[Elizabeth]

My ranking:

The Trees
When We Cease...
The Man Who Lived Underground
The Promise
Hell of a Book
Infinite Country

Oh wait. (sigh)

[Kyle]

The Promise was so good. Still kinda salty about that one not making it.

(I'm also finishing Great Circle, which... I don't even know if it was long-listed, but is excellent.)

[Lauren]

Elizabeth wrote: "My ranking:

The Trees
When We Cease...
The Man Who Lived Underground
The Promise
Hell of a Book
Infinite Country

Oh wait. (sigh)"

Ha! I'm hoping all four of those make it into our Tournament of Favorites/Tournament That Wasn't this year! I have copies on my shelves waiting to be read (I did audio for three of them last year, but want to read all four in print).

[Maggie]

Would anyone like a free copy of In Concrete?

I bought it because my library didn’t have it, but I have a policy of only keeping books I love, and for me it was just OK. Instead of just donating it or paperbackswaping it, I figured my ToB brethren would get the most joy out of it.

Just send me a message to claim it. I’ll put it in the mail tomorrow so you’ll have time to read it before the tourney. USA only please, I don’t want to fill out a customs form 😋

[Lee]

Did y’all see there’s new 2022 shirts and a wordle-inspired mug out?

https://tmn.creator-spring.com/listin...

https://tmn.creator-spring.com/listin...

https://tmn.creator-spring.com/listin...

https://tmn.creator-spring.com/listin...

[Ellen]

Hmmm. Call me dense, but I don't get the t-shirt design. LOVE the mug, though. I wish I didn't have a hundred mugs.

[Elizabeth]

Ellen wrote: "Hmmm. Call me dense, but I don't get the t-shirt design. LOVE the mug, though. I wish I didn't have a hundred mugs."

There's a rooster in there if you squint! It took me awhile too. I'm...not sure how I feel about the shirts. The mug is great, though.

[Lee]

I just realized you can also get that mug design on a t-shirt actually. I can make out an "OOKS" on the first design. My wife pointed out the three 2 numerals, which took me awhile longer to notice! So I guess it's the 222 Tournament of Ooks. Which does sound like something Gary Shteyngart might be involved with.

[Kyle]

That, or the Librarian at Unseen University...

[Kyle]

Do we know what the start date of the Tournament is?

[Phyllis]

Lee wrote: "Did y’all see there’s new 2022 shirts and a wordle-inspired mug out?..."

I am super sad there are no women's relaxed fit tees this year.

[Jan]

Kyle, pretty sure it’s March 8.

[Bob]

Glad they still have the TOB Loincloth from last year: https://tmn.creator-spring.com/listin...

[Peggy]

Phyllis wrote: "I am super sad there are no women's relaxed fit tees this year."

Whaaat?!? That's terrible news. I live in those tees. :(

[Maggie]

I asked in discord, Andrew said the distributor stopped having them and isn’t sure if they’ll get them back. I’m crushed, I adore those slouchy tees.

[Jenny (Reading Envy)]

GUYS! I have avoided SnapChat, YikYak, and TikTok. Now I'm going to have to use Discord for book chat?

I think that gets you a ::dustystick::

HAHA double points for book whining and ToB book reference.