I blame myself. My dictatorial instincts have recently been focused elsewhere, and I've been suffering a crisis of conscience over whether or not content should be free. In general, I agree that free content is nice, as long as the providers aren't self-righteous about it. But ideally, I think their podcasts, blogs, v-logs, and YouTube stunts should be ancillary to work they are actually paid for. Gloating over the death of a magazine that would pay you for the same content you give away for free is the sort of thing that, hypothetically, might classify your podcast as no longer tolerable. And it upsets me greatly that the guys from LOSTcasts put so much thought into their work while TV reporters at the New York and LA Times are paid not to.
But I digress, and use "I" more than I'd like. In the interest of keeping our blog alive for at least a full year, allow me to suggest some changes to for our review formula. Specifically, how we go about book reviews.
A book-a-week reader as a student, I couldn't imagine a life where time spent reading books would become a luxury. But here I am. As a fully-employed reader, writer, and gamer, I currently view books according to three criteria:
- Time: Is it worth the time spent to read/listen to a book?
- Money: Is it worth the cost of the reviewed format of the title (hardback/audiobook/trade/etc.)?
- Wait: Is it worth the wait to get it at the library or for a different format?
Note that these are the same criteria I use to judge anything supposedly entertaining or enlightening, from Battlestar to Buddhism.
As a hibernating aspiring novelist myself, I hesitate to suggest that a book is not worth the time spent reading it (you can learn something from any book, especially the bad ones). But there's no reason we should treat books with kid gloves when we're so harsh with more collaborative media like television, movies, games, and porn. Yes, it's sad for Christopher Pike if he spends years (benefit of the doubt) on his latest adult novel, only for some interlard to dismiss it as a waste of your time. But it's significantly more cruel to bash BSG or Sakura Tales, something we do often. It's probably not Apollo's fault that Starbuck isn't dead, and Mika Tan puts a lot more on the line than Christopher Pike. His heart may be on the page, but you won't recognize his face at the mall.
I'm not advocating that we descend to 5-sentence book reviews, but I think if we keep time, money, and wait in mind, it might be less daunting to get book reviews up on a regular basis. We need something to write about until television comes back. And our 8 readers might appreciate suggestions on what else they could be reading when I get passive-aggressive and refuse to post.
3 comments:
I'd suggest that we also measure how it affects our interest in the author's continued wares. I don't just hunger for new books anymore, I also hunger for authors who make me want to read more of their wares. Some of that is the whole, "Well, you've spent this much time reading this series, so I suppose you should read this book too," factor. The rest is "Well, even if this book wasn't good, there were enough hooks that his next one might be great." It also provides another axis of evaluation, one that might help to chart why, for example, I have yet to read the latest Tiffany Aching novel. At what point in a series of perfectly acceptable books did I suddenly decide that I was in no rush to pick up the latest wares of Terry Pratchett?
An interesting and valid point. What do we call that? Wareability? Seriesousness?
I vote for seriesousness.
"Bangkok Haunts rewards the seriesousness of dedicated readers, if for no other reason than it's got more ghost."
...how can I possibly turn down a term like "Seriesousness?"
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