From Margaret Atwood to Hanya Yanagihara: the best books of the 2010s, a decade in review
- Paper books won the battle with e-books and the international limelight shone on Asian authors
- Ken Liu and Liu Cixin brought Chinese science fiction to the fore, while Han Kang led the way for Korean-language novelists
The end of 2019 offers a double opportunity to review both a year and a decade in books. Covering 12 months is hard enough in our hyperspeed and atomised hi-tech age: what chance for 120?
In many ways, this hyperspeed, atomised hi-tech age is the literary story of the past 10 years. Not only are books competing with the increasingly seductive and effortless attractions of the internet, gaming and the seemingly infinite supply of bingeworthy television shows, films and albums streamed straight into our hands, books (at least of the old-school variety) are competing against themselves.
The previous decade ended with obituaries for the hard-copy book: 2011 was the first year in which e-book sales outstripped those of hardcovers, at least in the United States. If you factor in the rising popularity of downloadable audiobooks, then the printed word’s future on the planet seemed as gloomy as that of the planet itself. Bid farewell to the dust jacket, say hello to the enhanced e-book, with music, sound-effects and hyperlinks to all manner of extras.
Book signings were a thing of the past; as Margaret Atwood showed, 21st century authors could autograph e-books remotely. Publishers should also beware now that technology has made self-publishing as easy as releasing Fifty Shades of Grey online.
While our hyperspeed, atomised hi-tech age has ensured reading has never been more central to daily existence, there is no end to critics pointing out that skimming social media, instant messages and newsfeed headlines is nothing like the sustained focus demanded by a novel.