I read some thoughts over at Reading Matters. Basically the guy goes off on Updike’s new book Terrorist. I have not read Updike’s latest, but I do have to nod in agreement to his general view of the books big houses are cranking out these days.
I am in no way a “serious lit” reader. I wish I could get into a lot of the classics and put forth thoughts on liteary theory. But all that takes the fun out of books, for me. I like a good read. Period. That means good writing too.
Simon & Schuster is producing a new online “get published” site. It’s called First Chapters and is being touted as a web-based “American Idol for books”. Basically, unpublished authors submit works, then everyone votes, etc., etc. After weeks of narrowing the field a panel of judges awards the winner $5,000 and a publishing contract.
I guess any publicity for the publishing industry is good. But this just seems like a convoluted way of arriving at a book with mass appeal via the “lowest common denominator”.
I’ll check in once the field has been cut to the finalists. The whole point of relying on publishers and editors is so they cut through all the crap for me and I don’t have to waste time wading through stuff that’s not any good.
I see that they are re-airing the hand-illuminated St. John’s Bible segment again. It’s pretty good. Plenty of discussion about the publishing process of a project this size and the artist’s design process.
