Books: Douban users' top picks

Back in April we did a post on the top ten books favored by the users of Douban.com, a book review and recommendation site. Since that time, tastes have changed and new books have been released so it's about time to take a new look at the site's top ten:

1. JK Rowlings - "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" (Does this need an explanation?)
2. Han Han - "The Glorious Day I" (Magical realism from Shanghai teen prodigy, blogger, "most read" post-80s author.)
3. Audrey Niffenegger - "The Time Traveller's Wife" (Author's first novel, a love story with a sci-fi twist.)
4. Car"Ballad Of The Sad Café" (Southern Gothic short stories by melancholy American author, first Chinese publication in April.)
5. Sang Gege - "When I Was Young" (70s and 80s nostalgia by 27 year-old, Wang-Xiaofeng-endorsed deputy editor at Urban China magazine, started as a weblog.)
6. Orhan Pamuk - "Istanbul: Memories of a City" (Melancholy and disturbing ruminations on the identity of a changing city by the first Turk to win a Nobel Prize.)
7. Lian Yue - "I Love Asking Lian Yue"(Collection of this journalist and blogger's "I Am Chicken Soup" column for the Shanghai Weekly.)
8. Song Hongbing - "Currency Wars" (Discussion of global banking and its effects on China, by a veteran of the US financial sector.)
9. Tian Yuan - "Double Mono" (Beijing author, HK actress, lead singer of band Hopscotch, and blogger/MySpacer writes about love, youth and self-discovery.)
10. Carolyn Parkhurst - "The Dogs of Babel" (Dog who witnesses wife's death taught to talk by husband, by professional American writer.)

Contrast that list, by young, connected Chinese, with the Amazon-affiliated Joyo.com's top seller list: "Harry Potter", "Don't Laugh, I'm an English Book" (humorous English textbook, translated from Korean), "Better To Ask Yourself Than To Ask A Doctor" (medical reference book), "If Life Is Merely A First Impression" (classical poetry commentary), "The Book of Bunny Suicides" (cartoons of... bunny suicides), "Kids" (cartoons by Zhu Deyong), "Currency Wars", "Si Wu Xie: Recalling the Memory of Past Life" (poetry appreciation), "The Dogs of Babel".

Read the complete post at http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/shanghaiist/~3/145654728/books_douban_us.php