by JULIET WATERS

Compared to 2001, with its obvious stars like Jonathan Franzen and Alice Munro, 2002 may seem a little lame. What about Yann Martel you ask? Sorry, he was on last year’s list (and the Mirror book critic will now take a little bow for being one third of the only jury in Canada to have awarded Martel a prize in 2001, The Hugh McClennan award for fiction). Still, looking back there seem to have been more purely enjoyable books than usual. Here are some that stand out.

1. The Little Friend by Donna Tartt. Not a perfect book, but Tartt still has more ability to enchant in one pinkie than the vast majority of today’s writers. This is what Harry Potter fans may be reading when they hit the age to start delving into more serious literature. It’s also what all those regressing adult readers have been missing: a novel that evokes the pure pleasure you felt the first time you discovered a literary friend.

2. The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber. It’s hard to imagine the planned movie starring Kirsten Dunst. This retro Victorian novel about a 19-year-old prostitute’s rise and fall is so darkly erotic, it’s like something Dickens would have written if there were no censors. The thing about movies is that there are censors. Read it before they wreck it.

3. Coraline by Neil Gaiman. This may be the only truly “great” book of the year, a terrifying Alice and Wonderland for our era. The only reason it’s not number one is from worry that adults will turn it into some kind of “family” reading. But this archetypal tale of narcissistic parents who are self-absorbed in one world and needy and grasping in another should be left on a dusty shelf for kids to discover so they can be scared shitless all on their own, since isn’t this what great literature is for?

4. The Laying on of Hands by Alan Bennett. After Bennett published these short stories, Britain’s most prolific writer descended into a paralyzing writer’s block. He claims these gems are “as dark as I could let myself be publicly, without being rejected altogether.” He may be right, but they’re funny as hell.

5. Sea Peach by Catherine Kidd and Jack Beetz (includes CD). You saw the show in a swimming pool, or maybe you didn’t. But either way this “bonsai performance” version of Kidd’s endlessly awaited novel Bestial Rooms is the most inspiring piece of local literature since Life of Pi, which, come to think of it, also had a zoological slant. I sense a trend.

6. Fences and Windows by Naomi Klein. Even if this weren’t a lucid, readable primer on contemporary social activism, everyone should buy it - if only because proceeds will be going towards a legal defence fund for activists.

7. Stupid White Men by Michael Moore. Hipsters dismiss him as a badly dressed self-promoting goof. Liberals ask if the world really needs a Rush Limbaugh of the left. Well, ask a stupid question and you’re likely to get a stupid answer, like duh! Does it ever.

8. Jerusalem Calling by Joel Schalit. Just so the far left isn’t left without anything to read over the holidays, Schalit’s attack on American fundamentalism is one of the most provocative collection of essays to come from south of the border. Stay tuned next year for a review of his anti-capitalism reader.

9. Porno by Irvine Welsh. It’s about time Welsh came up with a sequel to Trainspotting. Finally after his streak of big, dreary brutal books, something fun.

10. Daily Afflictions by Andrew Boyd. Self-help for those who understand that being ironic is the only way one can take oneself seriously. A perfect book for the New Year. •