Best Books of the Year So Far 2008: Hidden Gems

Best of the Year So Far: Hidden Gems

This January we introduced our Best of the Month page, which features our editors' favorites of the new books (and which keeps us on our toes all year long scouting out the best new releases for you). Now, in keeping with a summer tradition of the past few years, it's time for us to take a moment to look back and choose, out of all those picks--along with a few that we missed on the first time through--our Best Books of the Year So Far.

As we did last year, we've organized our choices into four lists: 10 books each from the first six months of 2008, presented in alphabetical order by the author's names (summertime is too relaxed to rank them any more than that). In addition to our list of hidden gems below, which includes books that don't quite fit in any of our other categories as well as ones we thought deserved more attention so far this year, take a look at our favorites in fiction, nonfiction and books for children and teens.

100 Days of Monsters by Stefan Bucher	Metro Stop Paris by Gregor Dallas
Coolest. Book. Ever. Illustrator and designer Bucher filmed himself creating monsters out of inkblots every day for 100 days and posted them online where fans developed stories about each one. 100 Days of Monsters includes all the monsters, 257 of the stories, and a DVD full of addictive videos of Bucher at work.	No travel guide to Paris can match what Métro Stop Paris offers: a fascinating portrait of the city--cleverly told through just 12 of its 300 métro stops--that draws from a rich cultural and political heritage to help define and decrypt its wonder and romance for "the thinking tourist."
• Read more about 100 Days of Monsters	• Read more about Metro Stop Paris

Pravda by Edward Docx	Kirby: King of Comics by Mark Evanier
Edward Docx's Pravda was longlisted for the Booker Prize (under its UK title, Self Help), but it appeared here this spring with little fanfare. That is wrong. A smart, passionate, and relentlessly vital family story set, vividly, in London, Paris, and St. Petersburg, Pravda shows Docx is the equal of better-known peers like Zadie Smith, Jonathan Franzen, and Claire Messud who are proving that the 19th-century novel can still bring the 21st century alive.	In the world of comics, it doesn't get any bigger than artist Jack Kirby. In Kirby: King of Comics, Mark Evanier (a former Kirby assistant) profiles his mentor with a gorgeous biography featuring rare sketches from private collections and stunning reproductions of classic adventures. It's an indispensable collection for any comics aficionado, but one doesn’t need to be a die-hard to appreciate the POW! WHAM! BIFF! goodness of Kirby's genius.
• Read more about Pravda	• Read more about Kirby: King of Comics

The Fruit Hunters by Adam Leith Gollner	Rock On by Dan Kennedy
In The Fruit Hunters, Adam Leith Gollner instantly adds a welcome addition to the food-lit genre, offering readers an obsessive chronicle of all manner of exotic fruits and the passionate, quirky (and sometimes corrupt) characters who harvest, hunt, buy, sell, smuggle, and regulate the trade of hundreds of rare fruits. You've probably never tasted a peanut butter fruit or an orange cloudberry, but Gollner brings alive these taste sensations in an equally sensational debut.	In Rock On, Dan Kennedy's punk-rock attitude gets a severe wake-up call on day one, when his six-figure major-label dream job kicks off with a promotion celebrating the "Love Songs of Phil Collins." But Kennedy transforms his ringside seat of the music industry's collapse and the rise of corporate rock into a self-deprecatingly hilarious account peppered with uncomfortable music industry cameos throughout.
• Read more about The Fruit Hunters	• Read more about Rock On

All Known Metal Bands by Dan Nelson	Knockemstiff by Donald Ray Pollock
Leatherwolf. Lord Goatwarr. Ultra Vomit. These and so many more have undertaken the ultimate quest: "to unearth, embody, aim, and deliver power itself." The power of Heavy Metal. All Known Metal Bands descends into the Metal underworld to collect the names of nearly 51,000 bands, presenting its dark litany in a treatment sure to glow evilly in the black light of a sunless, suburban bedroom. AKMB is the story of dragons and demon-lovers, of werewolves and Walpurgisnacht, of extraneous umlauts and the power of power chords. It is the story of Metal.	In this fictional tour of his Ohio hometown, Donald Ray Pollock pulls no punches--his prose is blunt and visceral, as well as stylish and skilled--and reading these mini grand guignols can be like crunching on a mouthful of your own broken teeth. He resists casting judgment (or sympathy) on his doomed reprobates; predator or prey (or sometimes both), Pollock contemplates his characters with all the warmth of a "frozen bleach bottle." It's an astonishing debut.
• Read more about All Known Metal Bands	• Read more about Knockemstiff

Not Quite What I Was Planning by Larry Smith and Rachel Fershleiser	Perfumes: The Guide by Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez
Funny, sad, strange, brief--like life.	There's nothing quite like having a passionate subculture opened up to you, and even (or especially) if you're one of those people who dashes through the cosmetics section trying not to get sprayed, you'll find the most delicious writing of the year in Perfumes: The Guide. Turin and Sanchez are witty, dishy, and wise, and their tiny essays on hundreds of scents confirm that the best way to know life is to know one thing very, very well.
• Read more about Not Quite What I Was Planning	• Read more about Perfumes: The Guide

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