“The Hatchet Job of the Year Award is for the writer of the angriest, funniest, most trenchant book review of the past twelve months. It aims to raise the profile of professional critics and to promote honesty and wit in literary journalism. Hatchet Job of the Year is a crusade against dullness, deference and lazy thinking. It rewards critics who have the courage to overturn received opinion, and who do so with style. Most of all, it is a public celebration of that most underpaid and undervalued form of journalism: the book review.”
Click here to see the shortlist.
“In Tuesday’s judgment, the judge wrote that Barber knew her claim of not being interviewed to be false. He also wrote, ‘The interview allegation does not relate merely to professional practice. It is an attack on Dr Thornton’s honesty. I accept Dr Thornton’s view that there could hardly be more serious an allegation to make against someone in her profession.’ Barber’s review also accused Thornton of giving her interview subjects ‘copy approval,’ which the court ruled was libelous.”
The New York Times was always hysterical about sex of any kind, and Orville Prescott, then the principal book reviewer, said that under no circumstances would any book written by Gore Vidal be reviewed there again. Ever. Not to be mentioned in the New York Times is, I have always thought, a point of honor. So I survived and I notice that the New York Times did not. They can’t get any advertising, and I chuckle over that as much as possible.
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Gore Vidal, discussing the “dire” circumstances surrounding homosexuality which led him to use the pen name, Edgar Box.
In 1952, writing as Edgar Box, a young Gore Vidal published Death in the Fifth Position, the first of three tawdry, pseudonymously published mystery novels that boldly defied the era’s prudish conventions.
Read more at Details: “Q&A: Gore Vidal”
(Source: The Huffington Post)
Victoria Strauss (Writer Beware) reviews the new $149 Publishers Weekly Select program for self-published authors.
Is it ever worthwhile to buy a review? Not in my opinion. With independent paid review services, quality can be a problem; plus, there are plenty of non-professional book review venues out there that will review for free.
ForeWord Reviews publisher Victoria Sutherland volleyed,
In the literary world, free (poverty) seems to have been the only criteria for integrity. Yet, people happily pay doctors and lawyers for a diagnosis—plenty of conflict there to enourage clients to come back for more. What critics of our pay for service miss is what they accept about lawyers and doctors - namely that reputation means a lot to a professional—and the path to your door will grow weeds fast when you prove to be a sellout.
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