jueves, 7 de agosto de 2008

Life-changing fiction

So, I read about this on one of my favorite blogs, the girl who married a bear, which is written by Milla. (On a side note, if you haven't read her blog yet, do so, she's in my bloglist. It's just such a great escape when the 'real' world seems a bit too.... mundane).
Milla read about this on one of her favorite blogs, ran by author Lauren Groff. Ms. Groff narates something that happened to another author, Brendan Halpin. You can go back blog by blog to read the full story (told in a much more ingenious way than I could ever possibly dream of) but to make the story short...
Mr. Halpin had used the term "life-changing fiction" to refer to his own work in a post in his blog. To his, Milla's, Ms. Groff's and my surprise, he was approached by self proclaimed NY Times best selling author Karen Kingsbury who informed him the term was copyrighted and that it could only be applied to her own works (inspirational Christian writing if you were wondering).

Yup. That's right.
Life is, indeed, sometimes weirder than fiction. So, I'm joining the sabotage to Ms. Kingsbury pretentious attitude and dedicating this post to what I consider is truly LIFE-CHANGING FICTION.
I encourage everyone who was ever moved by a book created by someone other than dear Ms. Kingsbury should to join in.

So... here's my small contribution to the life-changing fiction cause (in my humble, young and inexperienced opinion). Some of the books I'm mentioning here were originally written in Spanish but have great English translations. I highly recommend them.
By the way, Dear Ms. Kingsbury, this is only a tiny fraction of LIFE-CHANGING FICTION I can think of, off the top of my head and having been sick for the past 5 days. I bet everyone I know could probably come up with their own list and we wouldn't even have the need to start repeating books. That's how many great books there are in this world of ours. That's how much life changing fiction has been written.


Los Detectives Salvajes, Roberto Bolaño.
(The English translation, the Savage Detectives has just come out and was chosen by the NY Times as one of the 10 Best Books of 2007. This book is what I would call ultimate life-changing fiction)


Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges

So, what has been, in your experience, life-changing fiction? I'm dying to know.

8 comentarios:

Rebecca, A Clothes Horse dijo...

Wonderful choices. That woman is truly ridiculous. I think I will coin the term "that woman is ridiculous"--you may only now use it in reference to a certain female author. ^_^

Milla dijo...

I love your life-changing fiction! I'm taking "Moon Palace" out from the library right now. I've been trying to figure out what Auster to read.

Rebecca, A Clothes Horse dijo...

P.S. I just discovered that matching my nails can be elegant and pretty--I used to always mismatch.

Anónimo dijo...

the bell jar- sylvia plath

Mónica dijo...

Paul Auster es siempre una buena opción

Nadya dijo...

definitely norwegian wood!

Toujours Dimanche dijo...

Novels by Milan Kundera, especially La vie est ailleurs (the title in french...) was a big inspiration for me. Thanks for your choices! It gives me ideas for my next reading.

B.B. dijo...

I would add 'By Night in Chile,' by Bolano, 'The Little Girl Who Was Too Fond of Matches,' by Gaetan Soucy, 'The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,' by Junot Diaz, 'Cronopios y Famas,' by Julio Cortazar, and anything by W.G. Sebald. Also, 'The Elephant Vanishes' by Murakami. Your choices, though, are impeccable.