If these guys recommend books, they're worth reading

The National Book Critics Circle has issued its second list of books a lot of very well-read people hope you will read. Initially called the "most recommended" list, the NBCC has decided on a seasonal theme for this quarterly offering, namely "Good Reads: Winter List." Five hundred critics and authors, including the likes of Annie Proulx and Jonathan Franzen, sent in their votes.

At 7 p.m. Monday at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park, two local award-winning authors, National Book Award Winner Charles Johnson and NBCC winner Jonathan Raban, as well as this writer and Seattle Weekly critic Brian Miller, will use the NBCC list as a springboard "for a discussion on good books, good reviews and how much difference a recommendation — be it from a critic or a friend — makes."

We hope you will come; for more information, call 206-366-3333 or see www.thirdplacebooks.com. Meanwhile, check out the NBCC blog at http://bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/.

Here's the winter list:

Fiction

1. "Tree of Smoke" by Denis Johnson (Farrar,

Straus and Giroux)

2. "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao"

by Junot Diaz (Riverhead)

3. "Diary of a Bad Year" by J.M. Coetzee

(Viking)

4. "People of the Book" by Geraldine Brooks

(Viking)

5. "Zeroville" by Steve Erickson (Europa

Editions)

Nonfiction

1. "The Rest Is Noise" by Alex Ross (Farrar,

Straus and Giroux)

2. "Brother, I'm Dying" by Edwidge Danticat

(Knopf)

3. "In Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan

(Penguin Press)

4. "Musicophilia" by Oliver Sacks (Knopf)*

5. "The Shock Doctrine" by Naomi Klein

(Metropolitan)*

Poetry

1. "Elegy" by Mary Jo Bang (Graywolf)

2. "Time and Materials" by Robert Hass (Ecco)*

3. "Gulf Music" by Robert Pinsky (FSG)*

4. "The Collected Poems, 1956 — 1998" by

Zbigniew Herbert (Ecco)

5. "Sharp Teeth" by Toby Barlow (Harper)

*There was a tie for fourth in nonfiction, and for second in poetry.

Mary Ann Gwinn, Seattle Times book editor