The Liminal Librarian

I was over on the Library Journal site today reading their “Professional Media” reviews. How many books this month? All of three. I’m disappointed in LJ, because they only review professional titles once a month or less often, and the columns have been getting shorter and shorter. Am I alone in wishing for more coverage of professional titles in the literature?

However, I was pleased to see a review of Nicole Engard’s Library Mashups today. (Yes, I edited it, but it is nonetheless fantastic.)

I always get a kick out of reading about authors’ overreactions to negative reviews, but it’s been a while since I’ve read some great ones. (See all the fun from last April for more along these lines!)

So, I was pleased to see some new rantiness appear. Here is just part of a mind-boggling example:

In last Sunday’s New York Times Book Review, Caleb Crain reviewed Alain de Botton’s The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work. While regular NYTBR watchers like Levi Asher welcomed the spirited dust-up, even Asher remained suspicious about Crain’s doubtful assertions and dense prose.

But on Sunday, de Botton left numerous comments at Crain’s blog, writing, “I will hate you till the day I die and wish you nothing but ill will in every career move you make. I will be watching with interest and schadenfreude.”

You don’t see a lot of schadenfreude in blog comments these days! Maybe it’s all moved to Facebook and twitter, too. Oh wait — something has! Check this out — Alice Hoffman (although she later apologized and deleted) got mad enough to post the private email address and phone number of one of her negative reviewers to her twitter feed. Hmm. Maybe I should finally get myself a twitter account after all, apparently I’m missing all the fun…

This is fascinating. Check out readerspoils.com, where you can review self-published books on Amazon in exchange for Starbucks gift cards — and PAY Reader Spoils to get your self-published book reviewed, as many times as you’d like. Did you know that:

Up until now the publishing industry kept a tight lock on their book reviewers, paying them large sums of money and giving them many freebies to urge them to review books for well known authors. The time has finally come where you, the self published author, can get quality, real life book reviews for the price of a couple of tickets to the movies.

I know — me either! If anyone has inside info as how I can get the publishing industry to pay me large sums of money and many freebies for reviews, I’m all ears… now that I know this, the Starbucks cards just aren’t going to cut it .

This should officially close the negative reviews theme. At least for a while..

Ever get mad at an editor? Read this for kicks and giggles (and profanity; you’ve been warned).

This negative reviews theme keeps cropping up: Over at Whatever, John Scalzi posted several of his one-star Amazon reviews and challenged other authors to do the same. (Read some here.) Here’s an excerpt from my own angriest one-star reviewer — enjoy!

Seriously, this book is a huge waste of time and money. There was absolutely nothing helpful about this book whatsoever. It contained depressingly obvious information, and even more depressing discourse from the various librarians quoted. If you want proper and helpful advice then I suggest saving your money and going down to the local library and asking the librarians themselves. You certainly can’t do worse then I did paying $30 to be kicked in the groin with ridiculously obvious “advice” and miserable ramblings about the futility of pursuing a rewarding career with a library science degree. Gordon’s book is a government pamphlet worthy, elementary book on how to choose a school, interview well, and how frustrating public employment can be. All is common knowledge to all but the most hapless uninformed high school student. I want my $30 back.

(I’m a much easier target than some of the Hugo- and Nebula-award winning folks Scalzi links to…)

Is it just me, or is this insane?

[Disclaimer: I haven't read this book, nor do I intend to.]

However, if someone wrote a blog post like this about one of my books, I don’t think this is the way I’d choose to respond. (Give it a minute, the comments get more … shall we say… pointed.)

What is it with the little spate of literary snobbery lately? I guess the Internet really does give a platform to everyone. But really, the better question is, how can one not love Ursula K. LeGuin.

…. Edited July 10 to add…

But wait, there’s more! Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Novels also point to an Erica Jong Publisher’s Weekly article talking about the marginalization of fiction written by women… and give their take on it.

I’ll leave this indiscriminate reporting business alone soon, I promise, but just wanted to point to this hysterical post, which includes such gems as:

4. Novels written by M.F.A.’s, or their friends and lovers, will be reviewed glowingly. The reviews will contain language such as “breathtakingly original” and “hauntingly luminous.”and

9. Each review will contain a quotation from Jacques Derrida, such as, “The epoch of logocentrism is the moment of the global effacement of the signifier.” (No, I can’t wait either.)

Also, as Sarah Johnson pointed out in a comment on the last post, this GalleyCat post notes that, 1) as one of the few bloggers to actually review Kohler’s book, Johnson also reviews historical fiction for Booklist (and has written a book on the subject), and 2) Kohler’s poor publicist has been going around trying to pitch the book to literary blogs.