Review of 2012

Not to take myself too seriously, but here are some of the things I've really enjoyed this year -- they didn't all come out this past year as I'm usually to be found rootling around in the long tail.

Let's start with...

ART

Richard Hamilton: The Late Works at the National Gallery

David Hockney: A Bigger Picture at the Royal Academy

Lucian Freud: Portraits at the National Portrait Gallery

Martin Honert: Children's Crusade at the Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin

Seduced by Art: Photography Past and Present at the National Gallery

BOOKS: FICTION

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (brilliant psychothriller)

Tin Toys trilogy by Ursula Holden (amazingly truthful portrait of childhood)

The Partnership by Barry Unsworth (wonderfully dark early novel by Barry Unsworth,died in 2012)

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont (great novel by woefully underrated writer)

Bird Brain by Guy Kennaway (lovely, funny novel of just deserts and making amends)

BOOKS: NON-FICTION

My Judy Garland Life by Susie Boyt (beautiful personal account of hero worship and empathy)

Seeking Rapture by Kathryn Harrison (memoir of an impossible-to-reach mother)

Delirious New York by Rem Koolhaas (psycho-architectural enquiry into New York City)

Groovy Bob by Harriet Vyner (oral history of Robert Fraser, the art dealer)

The True Adventures of the Rolling Stones by Stanley Booth (best rock tour account ever)

America: Empire of Liberty by David Reynolds (pulled together American history for me)

FILMS

True Grit remade by the Coen Brothers

Moonrise Kingdom by Wes Anderson

Nowhere Boy by Sam Taylor-Wood

Crossfire Hurricane documentary by Brett Morgen

The Queen of Versailles documentary by Lauren Greenfield

The Thomas Crown Affair -- the original by Norman Jewison

TV

The Killing III

Hunderby

The Glee Project

The Bridge

Murder

Moominland Tales: The Life of Tove Jansson

From the Sea to the Land Beyond

SINGLES

'Welcome Home' by Radical Face

'Home and Dry' by The Silver Seas

'A Lack of Understanding' by The Vaccines

'Hollow Talk' by The Choir of Young Believers (theme tune from The Bridge)

'Doom and Gloom' by The Rolling Stones (still got it)

plus

'Joburg Jam' by Pogo: