In last week’s Newcity Magazine (Chicago by Chicagoans!), John Freeman writes about being on the board of the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC). They have a blog! The article is unfortunately not online, but he talks about how “entries pile in by the pallet-full” for their annual book review awards, which makes me feel good about the state of the book market. But he also mentions how book sections in newspapers have been victims of recent cutbacks as “from Los Angeles to Memphis, newspapers slimmed down or picked up more wire copy.” Wire copy? So the news is moving even closer to being all from a single source?? Not good. That means more papers are going to be reading like the Redeye, which gets, by my approximation, 85% of their stories from the wires. At least there are still original voices on the internet.
Anyway, the NBCC picked “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by Junot Diaz a their book of the year. Have you read it? It’s on my list at goodreads.com. What are your favorite books/book suggestions?
