Tag Archives: Flavorwire

Best of 2013 Dept.: Flavorwire Picks Top Debut Novels

As Flavorwire notes in its intro to “The 10 Best Debut Novels of 2013,” “In composing their first novel, writers must temper their excitement at being given the opportunity to present hundreds of pages to the public with the discipline to create a story memorable enough to bring readers back for their second attempt.”

Here’s what Flavorwire says about Jenni Fagan’s “The Panopticon”:

Told in the lively slang of Anais, an orphaned 15-year-old Scottish girl who’s being hauled off to an unusual home for juvenile offenders over a violent crime she can’t recall whether she committed, The Panopticon is a dreamy document of friendship among young people who society has not only failed but scapegoated. Yet Fagan — an author whose experience as a poet comes through in her evocative prose — doesn’t sugarcoat her story or turn it into a tale of a bad girl gone good. There are moments of triumph for Anais, but there’s no panacea for her lifetime of terrible luck and systemic oppression.

The list:

1 Necessary Errors, Caleb Crain
2 The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P., Adelle Waldman
3 You Are One of Them, Elliott Holt
4 In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods, Matt Bell
5 The Facdes, Eric Lundgren
6 The Panopticon, Jenni Fagan
7 Tampa, Alissa Nutting
8 The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, Ayana Mathis
9 Mira Corpora, Jeff Jackson
10 Elect H. Mouse State Judge, Nelly Reifler

For comments about each novel, head to Flavorwire.

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50 Best Debut Singles in Music History? Do You Agree?


The Clash’s “White Riot” comes in at #8.

Today Flavorwire offers up what they say are the 50 best debut singles in music history. Given that #1 is the Bad Brain’s “Pay To Cum,’ I’d say this list, like all such lists, is a big dodgy. Still, you might enjoy disagreeing. Or not.

1. Bay Brains, Pay To Cum”
2/ Azealia Banks, “212″
3. Bauhaus, “Bela Lugosi’s Dead”

4. Boys Next Door, “Shivers”
5. Kate Bush, “Wuthering Heights”
6. Tracy Chapman, “Fast Car”

7. Neneh Cherry, “Buffalo Stance”
8. The Clash, “White Riot”
9. Leonard Cohen, “Suzanne”
10. The Cure, “Killing an Arab”

For the rest of the list, head to Flavorwire.