The Love German Books Seasonal Gift List 2012

You can gauge the progress of my Christmas shopping by the date I post this list every year. I may be cutting it a bit fine this time around. But here is a list of books translated from German to English that came out this year, all of which I can genuinely and honestly recommend. Those I haven't read personally, I still recommend because I know people who've loved them. Most of it is contemporary fiction, predictably enough perhaps. So now you too can bombard friends and relatives with Teutonic yuletide treats.

For the very literary: -->

Herta Müller: The Hunger Angel, trans. Philip Boehm

For the slightly silly:

Walter Moers: The Labyrinth of Dreaming Books, trans. John Brownjohn

For the rythmically inclined:

Thomas Lehr: September, trans. Mike Mitchell

For romantic souls:

Katharina Hagena: The Taste of Apple Seeds, trans. Jamie Bulloch

For Hanuka: 

Benjamin Stein: The Canvas, trans. Brian Zumhagen

For odd crime fans:

Wolf Haas: Brenner and God, trans. Annie Janusch

For walkers:

Christoph Simon: Zbinden’s Progress, trans. Donal McLaughlin

For reluctant travellers:

Sibylle Lewitscharoff: Apostoloff, trans. Katy Derbyshire

For Marxist genre-busters:

Dietmar Dath: The Abolition of Species, trans. Samuel Willcocks

For the unhappy:

Hansjörg Schertenleib: A Happy Man, trans. David Dollenmeyer

For the philosophical:

Peter Sloterdijk: The Art of Philosophy, trans. Karen Margolis

For Berlin fans (older):

Robert Walser: Berlin Stories, trans. Susan Bernofsky

For Berlin fans (younger):

Helene Hegemann: Axolotl Roadkill, trans. Katy Derbyshire

For poetry people:

Anja Utler: engulf - enkindle, trans. Kurt Beals

And if nothing takes your fancy, you can always look back at the lists from 2010 and 2011. No shopping list is complete, I'm sure you'll agree, without at least one German book on it.