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View Poll Results: October 2010 Mobile Read Book Club Vote | |||
The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson | 22 | 25.88% | |
Risen by Jan Strnad | 41 | 48.24% | |
Darkly Dreaming Dexter by Jeff Lindsay | 22 | 25.88% | |
Voters: 85. You may not vote on this poll |
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09-29-2010, 09:09 AM | #46 |
Bah, humbug!
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09-30-2010, 03:19 PM | #47 |
It's about the umbrella
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Wow, this looks like it should be a fun Book Club discussion month.
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09-30-2010, 03:25 PM | #48 |
Grand Sorcerer
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I wondered that myself. Would have thought that either Dracula or Frankenstein or both would have made Octobers list.
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09-30-2010, 03:35 PM | #49 | |
Grand Sorcerer
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Quote:
Anyway... some months we get many books others a few. I just go with the flow. BOb |
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09-30-2010, 09:19 PM | #50 |
Bombers last loss July 27
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I was going to nominate Dracula, but it won one month last year.
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09-30-2010, 10:55 PM | #51 |
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10-01-2010, 12:12 AM | #52 |
It's Dr. Penguin now!
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10-01-2010, 01:02 AM | #53 |
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About the low number of nominations: There's a thread on the Kindle Boards forum (http://www.kindleboards.com/index.php?topic=30529.100) asking "Is there any genre you won't read?" I didn't do an actual count, but "horror" came up as often as anything.
I've learned with Risen how that genre label can really work against you, especially with a book like Risen which I wrote for a more mainstream horror audience rather than for hardcore horror fans. Stephen King is wildly popular, but many, many people who love King will not read anyone else in the horror field. (Maybe a little Dean Koontz.) I got a number of responses to the print edition of Risen (you can look them up on Amazon, the original book edition) that started out, "I don't normally read horror, but...." This can be good, but it's incredibly difficult to market a "horror" novel to a non-horror readership! (Duh.) On the other hand, people who picked it up expecting a blood-n-guts zombie novel were disappointed, and it got a fairly poor review in Fangoria largely on that basis. The horror element is largely psychological, even philosophical, rather than visceral. It's as much suspense thriller as anything else, but there's no denying the horror element and it does fit in that genre. I am afraid, though, that it misses its target audience by being a bit fish and a bit fowl. Then there's the humor, and that comes from my ironic view of life. Humor and horror seem to intertwine in this world of ours. I think of the CEO of Segway who died recently when his Segway went over a cliff. What a tragedy, the senseless death of a good man, the people he left behind who grieve for him, etc. And yet...he drove a Segway over a cliff. You can't help but hate yourself a little bit for finding humor in that, yet there it is. Carl Hiassen could've written that scene. Anyway, that might be a reason for the low nomination count. |
10-01-2010, 01:29 AM | #54 |
Banned
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That's strange.
I find that hysterically funny and think it's wrong to fake compassion. It may just be me. Lucky world. |
10-01-2010, 04:43 AM | #55 |
neilmarr
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I'm afraid I'm one of the 'I don't read horror' brigade. My own wee house doesn't touch the genre. I found Jan's *Risen* when I was specifically scouting for books in that catagory to see if I should re-evaluate my prejudice of forty years' standing.
Jan's piece knocked my socks off because it was so grounded. The paranormal element crept into a fine running story with stealth, in full camouflage dress. I couldn't classify it as what I understood 'horror' to be. So I'm now unsure about 'horror' being a valid catagory in itself. What reading *Risen* taught me is that it's a far too generalised genre and merits further qualification. And this is a retail-imposed convenience that also leads books in other fixed catagories to be forced uncomfortably into a single available pigeonhole. Genre-defining restrictions are frustrating to the publisher and confusing and often misleading to the book browser. I wonder if, during the discussion, somone might come up with a realistic sub-catagory for a 'horror' book that breaks the mold. Perhaps a two-word phrase that could be used by publishers, agents and indie authors to more accurately describe a work. The current system of tagging a title in several established slots is broken. Had I been running *Risen* as a BeWrite Books title, I would have been forced, for instance, to tag it: horror/crime/lit-fic/mystery/zombies/romance/thriller/political corruption/police abuse/psychological/etc. Each alone would be off-target; together they help retailers and online searches, but confound the potential reader. Happy reading. Neil |
10-01-2010, 07:57 AM | #56 |
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I finished my September pile on time this month so I am ready to start Risen today. Can't wait.
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10-01-2010, 08:34 AM | #57 |
Grand Sorcerer
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The poll is closed and a winner has _Risen_ to the top.
Get reading peeps! BOb |
10-01-2010, 10:22 AM | #58 |
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10-01-2010, 10:28 AM | #59 | |
Grand Sorcerer
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Quote:
BTW: You can get this book at Smashwords DRM free. According to the InkMesh search this book is "secure" at Amazon: http://inkmesh.com/ebooks/risen-jan-...y+Jan+Strnad++ ... although it does say "Unlimited" devices. And it is cheaper at Amazon than at Smashwords. BOb |
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10-01-2010, 10:45 AM | #60 | |
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And it's only $2.39 at Amazon right now. |
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