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BooksNovember 11, 2016

Unity Books best-selling chart for the week ending November 11

Stacks of books
Stacks of books

The weekly best-seller chart at Unity stores in Auckland and Wellington, for the week just ended: November 11

WELLINGTON STORE

1 Sellout: A Novel (Oneworld, $28) by Paul Beattie

A review copy of the Man Booker award-winning dark satire on American life was despatched to Charlotte Graham on Monday, and she emailed on Wednesday morning to say, “I’ll have a bash at reading it today.” We replied, “While watching the future of the planet on cnn? Lol.” She replied, “Haha yeah, thought it seemed apt.” That night, she wrote, “Steve this seemed like a funny idea 12 hours ago.”

2 Rather Be the Devil (Orion, $38) by Ian Rankin

“In a tale of twisted power, deep-rooted corruption and bitter rivalries, Rather Be the Devil showcases Rankin and Rebus at their unstoppable best”: www.ianrankin.net

3 Les Parisiennes: How the Women of Paris Lived, Loved & Died in the 1940s (Weidenfeld & Nicholson, $40) by Anne Sebba

Linda Burgess has the pleasure of reading and reviewing this acclaimed book for the Spinoff Review of Books, and we look forward to her measured assessment.

4 The Sympathizer (Corsair, $28) by Viet Thanh Nguyen

Winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and 4.0 on Good Reads.

5 Hag-Seed (Hogarth, $37) by Margaret Atwood

O O O that Shakespearean rag.

6 Fucking Apostrophes (Icon, $19) by Simon Griffin

Your cool Simon!

7 Protecting Paradise: 1080 & The Fight to Save NZ’s Native Wildlife (Potton & Burton, $35) by Dave Hansford

1080 and the fight to save NZ’s native wildlife.

8 Murdoch: The Political Cartoons of Sharon Murdoch (Potton & Burton, $40) by Sharon Murdoch

Colin, among others.

9 Great War for NZ: Waikato 1800-2000 (Bridget Williams Books, $80) by Vincent O’Malley

The author is giving a talk in Gisborne on November 18 to mark the 151st anniversary of the siege of Waerenga-a-Hika.

10 Vegetarian: a Novel (Portobello, $23) by Han Kang

Winner of the 2016 International Man Booker Prize for fiction, and 3.62 on Good Reads.

 

AUCKLAND STORE

1 The Sellout (Oneworld Publications, $28) by Paul Beatty

2 Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (Harvill Secker, $40) by Yuval Noah Harari

“Harari argues that our quest for immortality and artificial life will make us evolve into god-like beings in the 21st century. Trouble is there’s little call for deities in a technologically controlled, data-driven world, which effectively means all our advancement, all our agrarian, industrial and internet revolutions, and all our wars, medical breakthroughs and social movements have simply been a means to paint ourselves out of the picture…Terrifying”: James Belfield, the Listener.

3 The Great War for New Zealand: Waikato 1800-2000 (Bridget Williams Books, $80) by Vincent O’Malley

4 Hot Milk (Hamish Hamilton, $37) by Deborah Levy

“The monkey is the best character. Skip the book”: An idiot, Amazon, on the Man Booker shortlisted novel set in a beach village in Spain.

5 Islands: A New Zealand Journey (Godwit, $80) by Bruce Ansley

One of the best pictorial books of the year, by the ace Waiheke author with legendary photographer Jane Ussher.

6 The Sympathizer (Corsair, $28) by Viet Thanh Nguyen

7 Commonwealth (Bloomsbury, $33) by Ann Patchett

“A first-rate novel about two families reconfigured by divorce that’s both tenderhearted and tough, dryly funny and at times intensely moving”: USA Today.

8 The Big Smoke: New Zealand Cities, 1840-1920 (Bridget Williams Books, $60) by Ben Schrader

New Zealand cities, 1840-1920.

9 Eileen (Vintage, $26) by Ottessa Moshfegh

“Wickedly suspenseful”: The Daily Telegraph.

10 A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Stories in Our Genes (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, $40) by Adam Rutherford

The laughing genome.

Keep going!