Anya ,'Showtime'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
Connie, Jonathan Franzen is a moderately talented writer of literary fiction who bitched when his novel was picked for the Oprah book club because he doesn't see himself as an Oprah kind of writer. She suspended the club the next month.
The thing is, though, Oprah should have been able to blow Franzen off like a gnat, both because she's infinite times more famous and because public opinion was on her side. I suspect she was looking for an excuse to quit the club anyhow, and he provided one.
That must be why they're focusing on classics. Dead authors don't bitch.
Has anyone read Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz? I just finished it last night and it broke my heart.
That is why they switched to classics.
The thing that bugged me about the Franzen mess was that, IIRC, he gave the OK for his book to be used, and then started bitching about it. (IIRC, a lot of his bitching was about "Oprah's Book Club" sticker that was put on his book, and something about how that degraded the value of his art. Or something like that. I can't entirely remember.)
Jonathan Franzen is a moderately talented writer of literary fiction who bitched when his novel was picked for the Oprah book club because he doesn't see himself as an Oprah kind of writer.
The guy didn't want hundreds of thousands of sales to fall from the sky? What is he, crazy? You'd think he'd be eager to tapdance naked on barbeque grills to get Oprah to mention his book in passing. What's missing from the equation?
What's missing from the equation?
Snobbery.
I want the week back I spent on the book, too.
Snobbery.
Ah, thanks. I ws thinking that most authors who didn't want that many people to pay for their book would at least like the idea of that many people reading the book, but I suppose there are people perverse enough that they are writing for a certain select audience and will get weird if someone wants to drop off a truckload of money and profile in their yard.
I believe at some point early in the brouhaha he said that his friends were laughing at him.
Well, hello? Satirist. Can dish it out but can't take it.