Have you ever read a book that won a major award and thought, “Were those judges all on Class B controlled substances?” One-Minute Book Reviews deals with questions like these in its occasional “Reality Check” series that explores whether recent winners of literary prizes deserved their honors.
Tomorrow this series will focus on Mary Jo Bang’s Elegy www.graywolfpress.org, which won the National Book Critics Circle award for poetry on Thursday www.bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com. You can find other posts in the series by using the search box on this site to search for “Reality Check.”
(c) 2008 Janice Harayda. All rights reserved.
I have that thought even when I haven’t read the books, but have read other books that never even made it on to the short list for the award.
Malcolm
Comment by knightofswords — March 9, 2008 @ 10:38 pm |
You mean because the ones that didn’t make it onto the shortlist were so good, you wondered how the others could displace them?
Comment by 1minutebookreviewswordpresscom — March 9, 2008 @ 11:11 pm |
Yes. It’s rather like hearing that an Egg McMuffin has been awarded THE BEST DAMN BREAKFAST AWARD while the Eggs Owen from Brennan’s in New Orleans didn’t even make it on to the short list.
Malcolm
Comment by knightofswords — March 10, 2008 @ 2:00 pm |