SOMEDAY ALL THIS WILL BE PICTURESQUE RUINS: Best of 2008.

Best books read (nonfiction): Same-Sex Desire in Victorian Religious Culture, Frederick Roden
The Letters of Abelard and Heloise/Heloise and Abelard, Etienne Gilson
I May Be Some Time: Ice and the English Imagination, Francis J. Spufford
Sexual Personae, Camille Paglia (more)
The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression, Andrew Solomon

Best books read (real books): The Little Friend, Donna Tartt–I’m not sure what I can say about this other than, READ IT NOW, since even discussing its general thrust and genre would be spoilerous. But I can tell you it is a terrific portrayal of childhood; it’s in some ways the opposite of The Secret History, and less addictive but just as accomplished; the ending is better, the prose is just as good (less urgent, more composed); basically this is an amazing book, part The Plague, part A High Wind in Jamaica, but mostly sui generis. If you liked TSH you owe this to yourself, but even if you didn’t like it, this one is different enough that you should check it out.
Cards of Identity, Nigel Dennis
Ladies Almanack, Djuna Barnes
Penthesilea, Heinrich von Kleist
Earthquake Weather, Tim Powers–sequel to both Expiration Date and (the terrific) Last Call; the terrible gifts of the god Dionysos, Powers’s usual fantasy of salvage deployed in the service of placing America in mythic tradition. Dark, painful, redemptive and expiatory… and featuring one of Powers’s best characters, Cody, certainly my favorite of his women.

Best movies watched for the first time: Ringu
Tokyo Godfathers
Repulsion
Shock Treatment
The Way Things Go

Best blog posts (six, not five, as is traditional):
A ridiculously long post on conservatism, complicity, and things that aren’t Godel–basically my position statement at the moment
How to Make Your Child a Gay Activist
Skirting the Issues (my review of the Shakespeare Theatre’s all-male Romeo and Juliet)
Resurrected words battle zombie words (ridiculous, ragged post about language, leadership, philosophy, and why our political rhetoric fails so epically)
The best horror anthology never made (with bonus theology!)
Mixing memory and desire: Notes from my Theology on Tap presentation (about gay Catholic whatnot)

Best things I wrote (nonfiction, non-blog): “Theology of the Body in Pain” (on torture)
“The Weakerthans: Liturgy of the Other Hours“
“Tainted Love” (on Heloise and Abelard–see link above)
“When I Was Cruel” (review of Alan Moore’s Small Killing)
“The Serenity Player” (review of Hermann Hesse’s Glass Bead Game)