Press Books: Publisher of the Noughties

Here at FifthEstate we don’t go in for self promotion too often, but we couldn’t help but notice that out of the 100 books the Telegraph proclaimed as the defining books of the Noughties (I considered an alternative title of this post ‘Noughties but Nice’ but couldn’t bring myself to inflict that on you) Press Books, the imprint from within which this blog is run, has a total of ten titles on the list. These are:

(92) Bad Blood by Lorna Sage

(89) Appetite by Nigel Slater

(86) Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters

(84) Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss

(70) Bad Science by Ben Goldacre

(62) Half a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

(55) Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

(48) Finest Years: Churchill as Warlord by Max Hastings

(36) Miracles of Life by JG Ballard

(24) The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

Over at the Times, a similar (but subtly different) list can be found with eleven titles from the Press Books publishing house.

The Times

(98) Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie(2007)

(84) Unless by Carol Shields (2002)

(78) Giving up the Ghost by Hilary Mantel (2003)

(54) Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Truss (2003) (repeat)

(50) No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies by Naomi Klein (2000)

(34) Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand (2001)

(28) The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century by Alex Ross (2007)

(26) Bad Blood by Lorna Sage (2000) (repeat)

(19) The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (2001) (repeat)

(18) Bad Science by Ben Goldacre (2008) (repeat)

(14) Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi (2003)

We thought, since this really is a genuine and fairly singular achievement and cause for celebration, it might be nice to feature each of the books on the list – if for no reason other than introducing you to a modern classic you might otherwise never have read. So do come back later next week, when the celebrations will begin!