The Observer asks a bunch of prominent intellectual types for their books of the year.  No word yet on what the nurses, plumbers, data analysts, and falafel vendors think.

Colum McCann – novelist

Zeitoun by Dave Eggers (McSweeney’s Books; published here in February by Hamish Hamilton) is an examination of America in the time of Katrina, an indictment of bureaucracy, a testimony to the possibility of goodness, a level-headed look at Muslim America, a heartbreaking rap sheet for the Bush years, all this and more… I was completely enthralled by this book from one of the most socially engaged and provocative writers of our times. The Infinities (Picador) is John Banville’s best book, I think. The prose is honed, as always, and every word matters, but the book breathes with humour and shines with a lovely discursive wink. It’s also the sort of novel that you nod along to, then it swerves and you don’t quite know where you are, but you experience the thrill of being suitably lost.