Best books of 2002: powerful novels, real-life adventures

If you love books, it's always a good year for reading. If you don't like what's in the stores, you can always harken back to a remembrance of volumes past — the best biography I read this year was "A Beautiful Mind," Sylvia Nasar's 1998 biography of mathematician John Nash.

But this year saw some very accomplished writing, both in fiction and nonfiction. This list of noteworthy 2002 books is my own wish list — books I read and loved or those I hope to, based on the recommendations of Seattle Times reviewers. (Book critic Michael Upchurch presents his best-of list below.)

"Breaking Clean" by Judy Blunt (Knopf, $24). Irene Wanner said of this unsentimental memoir of a ranch wife's life in rural Montana: "Memoirs have been trendy the past few years. This one, in which each word pulls its weight, is the real thing, all right."

"Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson" by Robert A. Caro (Knopf, $35). Steve Weinberg said that Caro "kept his promise" to highlight the two threads of Johnson's life in this third of four volumes: "One Caro has termed the 'bright thread,' signifying Johnson's involvement in issues meant to equalize rights for all Americans. The other is the 'dark thread,' representing Johnson's self-interested ruthlessness as he tried to dominate American politics."

"Caramelo" by Sandra Cisneros (Knopf, $24) Bharti Kirchner said of Cisneros' new novel: "Loosely based on the author's own Mexican-American family, the book not only depicts the story of the Reyes clan but also breaks the boundaries of fiction to become a cultural history of a people."

"The Fly Swatter: How My Grandfather Made His Way in the World" by Nicholas Dawidoff (Pantheon, $26). This author's portrait of his brilliant and eccentric grandfather prompted reviewer Erik Lundegaard to issue this challenge: "Do me a favor. Go to your local bookstore and read the first paragraph of 'The Fly Swatter,' Nicholas Dawidoff's memoir/biography of his grandfather, the renowned Harvard economist Alexander Gerschenkron, and then try not to buy the book."

"Perma Red" by Debra Magpie Earling (Blue Hen Books, $24.95). Kimberly B. Marlowe said this Montana-based novel is a "haunting and memorable story, which follows beautiful, willful Louise White Elk through her troubled life around the Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana during the 1940s. Earling's deliberate pacing gives an otherworldly feel to the grim circumstances of the time, and makes real the hypnotic effect of this slim, green-eyed woman on the men around her."

"Secrets" by Daniel Ellsberg (Viking, $29.95). Bruce Ramsey called this memoir of the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers "remarkable. ... Liberals should like this book a lot — particularly now, when they seem unsure of their own bearings. Conservatives, who resented Ellsberg 30 years ago, might tackle 'Secrets' with a new appreciation. His targets are just as often Democrats as Republicans, and one can easily accept his entire story as a tale of the mendacity of Big Government."

"Ninety Degrees North" by Fergus Fleming (Grove Press, $26). Of this survey of the misbegotten expeditions that looked for the North Pole and found disaster, David Laskin said: "Fleming's 'heroes' were vain, competitive, delusional, and sometimes downright foolish men who wasted lives and fortunes in the pursuit of their dreams. ... And yet, by some literary alchemy, Fleming has turned their disasters and disappointments into an absolutely splendid and oddly uplifting book."

"Spies" by Michael Frayn (Henry Holt, $23). Of this novel of childhood in wartime London, Alix Wilber said that "To a list of observant minors that includes Huck Finn and Scout Finch, add Stephen Wheatley, the narrator of Michael Frayn's haunting new novel, 'Spies' ... a jigsaw puzzle of a book, with Frayn effortlessly dropping pieces of information that seem to be one thing, then turn out to be part of something else entirely once they're fitted in their proper place."

"Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood" (Random House, $24.95) by Alexandra Fuller. I found this unsentimental memoir of family life in Zimbabwe a "vivid, funny and unrelentingly honest account of life in post-colonial Africa, a book that distills the sights, smells and tension of the conflict and the ravages it inflicted upon people of all colors."

"Three Junes" by Julia Glass (Pantheon $25). This novel, whose tale is told by focusing on different members of the same Scottish family, won the National Book Award for fiction this year, beating out a number of much better-known contenders. John Hartl said, "The past, relived and reimagined and filtered through the present, is her (Glass') true subject."

"Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before" by Tony Horwitz (Henry Holt, $26). Of this retracing of the famous explorer's travels and travails, Bill Dietrich said, "This alternately hilarious, poignant and insightful book is history for people who don't like history, and a travelogue full of wonder and smart observation, not jaded cynicism."

"Atonement" by Ian McEwan (Nan A. Talese/Doubleday, $26). This novel hangs on a false accusation made by a young British girl in the 1930s and its reverberations down the decades. It prompted reviewer Richard Wallace to ask: "Can certain actions be redeemed? McEwan says yes and no, and this equivocal answer has extended McEwan's range and power. It is as if an artist as smoothly precise as Alfred Hitchcock began to see with the vision of a Jean Renoir. 'Atonement' is an amazing accomplishment."

"By the Lake" by John McGahern (Knopf, $24). In this quiet novel about a rural Irish community, Valerie Ryan writes, "We observe the rituals of conversation, drinking bouts, social events and business transactions for a year in the lives of these people — their decisions, work and play, losses and joys and most of all, their genuine care for each other. A beautifully written book where not a lot happens except everything — the stuff of life."

"Family Matters" by Rohinton Mistry (Knopf, $26). This novel about the physical decline of a professional man in India and its unsettling effect on his family showcases this Canadian writer's multiple talents. "Mistry is a plate-spinner of a novelist, able to keep lots of ideas and moods aloft and twirling," wrote Carol Doup Muller.

"Benjamin Franklin" by Edward S. Morgan (Yale University Press, $24.95). Kevin J. Hamilton said that "Morgan draws almost entirely from Franklin's own writings to weave a comparatively brief (314 pages) essay on his most important contributions to his city, nation and world. ... Morgan's writing, fluid and thoughtful, narrates Franklin's life in the present tense, which brings a compelling immediacy to the text. "

"In the Forest" by Edna O'Brien (Houghton Mifflin, $24). This novel, based on a true story, of an orphaned boy who becomes a killer, moved reviewer Clarence Brown to say this: "No artistry can be greater than that with which O'Brien causes the reader simultaneously to participate in O'Kane's mental darkness, almost to love him, to be utterly terrified of what he will do next and to wish him dead. One must put the book aside from time to time in order to go outside, breathe deeply and pray for clarity."

"Blessings" by Anna Quindlen (Random House, $24.95). Quindlen's novel about a wealthy octogenarian and her estate's caretaker, and how their lives are changed when they take a baby into their care, prompted Barbara Lloyd McMichael to write: "Quindlen addresses questions of birthright, loyalty, grief and redemption. ... She considers how people try to accommodate their mistakes, if not atone for their sins. Quindlen's characters are true, their dialogue is real and their emotions are heart-wrenchingly genuine."

"The Lovely Bones" by Alice Sebold (Little, Brown, $21.95). Melinda Bargreen said of this novel, narrated by a 14-year-old girl who's murdered in the first few pages and tells her story while looking down on her family (and her killer) from heaven: "Every once in a while, you encounter a new novel so fresh and sure, so full of life, that it grabs you from the first chapter and doesn't let up on your imagination."

"Trail of Feathers" by Tahir Shah (Arcade, $25.95). Shah, a different kind of travel writer, presents a wild account of his journey through the nether regions of Peru. "If Woody Allen played Indiana Jones, the result could be something like Tahir Shah's 'Trail of Feathers,' a confluence of high adventure and low farce in pursuit of a serious research quest," said Deloris Tarzan Ament. "(Shah's) good-natured wonder never falters."