Contemporary fiction

[GracchusBabeuf]

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[x359594]

A newer writer that I like is Michelle Tea. Some of her books are the beautiful (sic) and Passionate Mistakes.

I think Joyce Carol Oates, Robert Stone, Don DeLillo and Thomas Sanchez are still writing good fiction.

There's still some good genre fiction being written: Walter Mosley, Joe Haldeman, China Mieville, Gary Phillips.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Is fiction writing completely dead?Of course not, haven't you ever read any of Glenn Beck's books:lol:.

By seriously, there is plenty of new fiction out there that's decent. Oates and DeLillio are interesting (although I haven't read any DeLillio since "Underworld"). David Foster Wallace's "Infinite Jest" is crazy, frustrating, but interesting and funny too. Michael Cabon, Margaret Atwood, Dave Eggers, and George Saunders are pretty entertaining. I'm not a fan of Cormack McCarthy but "the Road" was really moody and effective.

Fiction isn't dead, but I think a lot of popular culture is sort of in a holding pattern. The most interesting aesthetic and stylistic changes have strangely come from television (thanks mostly to serial dramas on cable and non-laugh-track comedies on networks - although the flip side is all the reality shit) while music and literature and film have been largely static since the 90s imho.

Personally I think we are in for a sudden and sharp shift in culture over the next decade (either before or accompanying a political shift in the US and much of Europe) because I think social and popular consciousness changes that have been building up through the Bush years and in the neoliberal period in general are boiling just under the surface. When things change socially a bit, I think culture will also have to change to meet the new situation.

[MarxSchmarx]

Any good recommendations?

Orhan Pamuk, Thomas Mullen, Louis de Bernieres and Haruki Murakami all write exceptionally rich, historically grounded and engaging novels about regular people and daily life.

Isabel ALlende also has a new book coming out.

[bcbm]

i'm a big fan of luther blissett/wu ming, who are an italian writers collective that put out a lot of good stuff. you can view all of their work for free on their website.

[leftace53]

Haruki Murakami

THIS!!

Also, Charles De Lint (I think he counts as "contemporary")