2004 — The Year of Kickass Mammoth Novels

Move over, David Mitchell. The Literary Saloon has gone gaga over Lars Saabye Christensen’s The Half Brother. And they’re not the only ones. Paul Binding says it’s “a deeply felt, intricately worked and intellectually searching work of absolutely international importance.” Anna Peterson calls it “a great river of a book.” And Boyd Tonkin calls it “a total knock-out of a novel ” Norman Mailer, however, remains convinced that he wrote it first, writing longhand in 1972 in Norwegian.