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Odds & Ends On The Web: August 11th Edition

8/11/2012

15 Comments

 
Odds & Ends on the Web logo The Readventurer
One of the biggest stories this week for avid readers was the release of Goodreads’ new reader and author guidelines.  Vacuous Minx has an excellent review of the two new policies.  After reading through the new guidelines, Goodreads’ vague responses to reviewer concerns, and this article about Goodreads’ founders, it has really been brought home to me that Goodreads is not actually the snug reading community I wanted it to be but is first and foremost a business.  A business which receives most of its revenue from publishers and authors.  So, I suppose it is understandable that they would act in their best interests.

However, I think that now more than ever, the Goodreads community is pretty ripe for the plucking.  Given a similar online forum with fewer ads, less author pandering, and more assurances of reader/reviewer rights, I think a large portion of the Goodreads community would leave.  One of my favorite bloggers, Amanda Nelson from @deadwhiteguys, is writing a series comparing Goodreads to LibraryThing (she has two posts up so far).  I’ve recently created a LibraryThing account and will probably be spending more time over there, so come find me! 

The other big news this week was NPR’s publication of its 100 Best Ever Teen Novels, which many of us nominated books for and eventually voted on.  The results are both completely unsurprising and a little baffling.  The popular giants – Harry Potter, The Hunger Games – are all there but then there are some odd choices.  The Hobbit, which I would consider a children’s book, is number three.  Lord of the Rings, which I would consider an adult book, is number seven.  NPR caused a bit of dissension when they initially culled some of the nominations for being outside the targeted age range, so it seems odd to see these two (among many others that seem inappropriate) among the winners.  Forever Young Adult published a hilarious response to the list, which I completely agree with.

Yet more idiocy in the “reviewing has become too nice” crisis of 2012 was published this week, prompting a very well-reasoned response from our friend Sarah over at Clear Eyes Full Shelves, which as usual, we agree with.

And a few other articles that made us shake our heads:

Sue Grafton expresses her rather strong opinion about indie/self-published authors.

The Atlantic asks: Why Do Female Authors Dominate YA Fiction? and includes this little gem in its response:

“Plenty of theories have been floated to explain YA's surge, particularly among adult readers. Some attribute it to ingenious marketing or to the childlike simplicity of the plots, suggesting that the craze is a distressing symptom of a reading public congenitally adverse to nuance. Matazzoni proposes that for adult readers, nostalgia plays an important role: "Readers have fond memories of being curled up with a book, in the summertime especially. Memories are what we believe people are tapping into, and the opportunity to share the books they love."

Dear Atlantic,

It’s probably a good idea to read a few (or a few hundred) YA novels before you start theorizing about their popularity.

Best,

The Readventurers


And finally, in more exciting/distressing news (depending on your point of view), Stephanie Perkins announced that her next book will be a teen slasher.  She writes, in part:

“Yes, it's a contemporary. The killer is not a supernatural creature. I'm talking about ye old traditional knife-wielding maniac.

Yes, it will be bloody.

Yes, it will be sexy.

Yes, it will be scary.

At least . . . I hope it'll be scary!”


What do you guys think?  Are you looking forward to a scary book from Ms. Perkins?  Or are you just scared?


15 Comments
Sarah Moon link
8/11/2012 04:55:40 am

Did y'all see <a href="http://gayleforman.tumblr.com/post/29005933585/more-rational-thoughts-on-ya">Gayle Forman's response</a> to The Atlantic piece about YA? She really nailed it.

I am not a big fan of slasher type stuff, but I love Stephanie Perkins' writing, so I'm betting she'll change my mind about that. :)

Have I mentioned lately how much I appreciate your curation of all the stuff I've missed reading each week? Because I love it!

Reply
Catie (The Readventurer) link
8/11/2012 06:13:52 am

No, I hadn't seen that but it's great! That's exactly what got me about that article too - because it does place YA in a positive light overall, but it's the insinuation that YA is somehow less worthy or less valid as literature, coupled with this observation that a lot of YA novels are written by women that really bothered me.

Have we mentioned how much we appreciate that you continually write thought-provoking pieces that we can link to in these posts? Because we do. :)

Reply
Heidi link
8/11/2012 06:36:41 am

Wow. A lot of news to take in... Well, I have to consider the Hobbit more of a YA book, yes it is targeted as a younger book but it is so complex that I think it is best for readers twelve and older while The Lord of the Rings could easily be Adult and YA. I read the Hobbit at ten and Lord of the Rings at 12-13 and reread them as an adult and appreciated them far more as an adult. Hmm the Sue Grafton stance on Indie self pubbed authors, well she does have some valid points. I know there are some gems out there, but I have personally been sent a bunch of not so shining books as well. It is the same of all books there are good books, bad books and mediocre, not matter who publishes them. OH and a slasher book by Stephanie Perkins, well I can't wait to read it! Oh and the Goodreads vs. Library Thing, I need to check it out because I have become very disinterested in Goodreads these days with all the drama.

Reply
Tatiana (The Readventurer) link
8/11/2012 11:05:34 am

A lot pf GR-ers will start exploring LT, but I believe they will be disappointed in it. That platform is not made for networking and communicating. Its main use is cataloging. So, while I agree that GR has put itself in a position of losing a lot of members, there isn't a good site yet to substitute it.

Reply
Kate C.
8/11/2012 03:01:03 pm

Hmmm... I foresee horror being the next big thing in teen fiction. Especially Fantasy Horror.
I can't picture Perkins writing slashers. At All. If she pulls it off she is a better writer than I give her credit for.
It is tough switching genres like that, especially when the two dramas involved are so different.

BTW- I LOVE Hitchhiker's Guide, but I can't for the life of me see how that got on NPR's list. It's not even in the YA section at my library! Seething that Anne McCaffrey got passed over for some of those names. I guess it's all about personal preference. :(

Reply
Flannery (The Readventurer) link
8/13/2012 06:09:05 am

Hitchhiker is the one I was most confused about as well. I loved it but I've never heard it categorized as YA nor do I think it really belongs there.

Though it would take a lot longer, it might be interesting to leave one of those Top 100 polls open for a much longer period--say, a month or two--to see if the results would be different. I just smiled thinking of doing a poll of the "Top 100 YA books that aren't on NPR's Top 100 YA books list" :)

Reply
Jasprit link
8/11/2012 08:51:30 pm

I didn't even know Goodreads had a new policy in place, I'm off to check it off now, but I agree with everything going on, a lot of readers will probably leave it :( I think I may have to check out LibraryThing too! And that's fantastic about Stephanie Perkin's new release it sounds amazing! As it will be a lot different to her contemporary novels! Thanks for sharing all these amazing links! :)

Reply
Flannery (The Readventurer) link
8/13/2012 06:02:43 am

I know! I'm so, so curious to see how Perkins will write horror. Curious and interested. I tried LibraryThing once but I didn't like the interface as much as Goodreads...which is pretty depressing considering how dull and bland the Goodreads interface is:)

Reply
Regina @ Badassbookreviews link
8/11/2012 11:55:16 pm

Tatiana I agree with you about LT. I have been on there for over two years and I mainly use it as a place to back up my bookshelves, ratings and reviews. Here is my profile: http://www.librarything.com/profile/ReginaR There are many benefits to LT. I like the recommendations function and the giveways are much better than Goodreads First Reads program (it is how I discovered the Rivers of London series), networking is hard on it. Shelfari is owned by Amazon and I believe is just a way for Amazon to try to expand (haha) its presence.

I love your letter to the Atlantic. I am off to read about the NPR hub bub.

Reply
Liza link
8/12/2012 02:43:37 am

I agree that Goodreads has its problems, but overall my experiences have been positive there. As a side story, I remember following Tatiana's reviews early on and through her profile discovering this blog. I also discovered a few others that I simply love, such as YA Bliss and Bewitched Bookworms. So in my mind Goodreads isn't that horrible. If it would just fine tune a few things and simply enforce its policies and not use vague wording in those same policies, things would improve.

As for the NPR list, I don't understand 1/2 of the list. It's like they were trying to placate two different crowds: those who only read popular YA despite it's quality and those who love classics and have lately been sticking it under the YA category to give YA legitimacy. Some of the books, just didn't make sense. The Lord of the Rings, while I loved it, I'd never consider it YA. Others just disappointed me such as putting in series that have yet to be finished such as the Mortal Instruments series. God knows how that series will end.

Very interesting week.

Reply
Tatiana (The Readventurer) link
8/13/2012 03:49:45 am

I just wonder what would make this panel decide that something like "My Sister's Keeper" is a YA book. That panel definitely needed to read Sarah's post

http://cleareyesfullshelves.com/blog/are-you-reading-ya.html

before attempting to vet the nominations. Their incompetence is annoying.

Reply
Sarah link
8/13/2012 03:52:04 am

Jodi Picoult's books are constantly miscategorized as YA, and it drives me crazy, because they're so very clearly written for an adult audience. *shakes fist*

Maja
8/13/2012 05:25:01 am

Hah, John Green has two books in the top 10. He is awesome, but he's not THAT awesome. Also, I can't believe The Fault in Our Stars made it all the way up there. It's a bit disturbing, if you ask me. That is, I was disturbed until I saw Mortal Instruments on number 20 or so.
I was sure I'd have some issues with the list, but not quite this many.

Reply
Tatiana (The Readventurer) link
8/13/2012 06:13:21 am

This list is part popularity contest, part driven by nostalgic readers who think teen lit is what they read as teens, but in its entirety it's a sloppy list moderated by people with no actual knowledge of YA literature.

Reply
VeganYANerds link
8/13/2012 03:21:48 pm

I was really disappointed with the NPR list: no Marchetta, no Eagar, no Zarr = boooo.

And thanks for the link to the GF/LT comparison. The thought of starting over on a new site does not excite me and I don't think I have any reviews that will get hidden but I'll wait and see if they make any other changes.

Reply



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