Fall Previews Arriving
As the New York Times needlessly reminds us, “The fall is really a long lead-in to the holiday season, the period when bookstores see the highest volume of sales for the year.” As a result, the season tends to be filled with big names, making it difficult to break out new authors
So, it’s no surprise that fall book previews are mostly devoid of surprises. Below are recent consumer media previews (we’re linking to the previews at the right, under Books of Fall ’10 — Previews):
USA Today Fall Books — Interactive Calendar — a great, quick take on 33 titles, mostly by familiar names, with just two less well-known titles:
- Sept. 14 — The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks and Giants of the Ocean, Susan Casey; Doubleday big nonfiction adventure story by O Magazine editor-in-chief.
- Nov. 16 — The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, Siddhartha Mukherjee (Scribner) — Nearly everyone in the US has been touched in some way by the disease, a ready audience for what advance readers are calling “a riveting and moving book.” The esteemed Nan Graham, editor of Scribner, says the is the most important book she has published in her career.
Associated Press — Books of Fall — This overview is partcularly strong on political books and presidential bios. The lead title, also included on every other list is The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Presents Earth (The Book): A Visitor’s Guide to the Human Race, Grand Central.
NYT — Fall Big Books — lists Stephen Hawking’s new book as a “sleeper hit”. Well, suggesting that the universe didn’t need a god to create it is bringing attention, but Hawking is hardly an unknown, having sold plenty of copies of his earlier A Brief History of Time (although there are those that claim nobody read it). This list includes several titles by and about musicians.
Wall Street Journal — Big Books of Fall — Even though this list is limited to just five titles, the WSJ manages to pick a title that is not on any other list, The Wake of Forgiveness, Bruce Machart, saying, it “…has reminded early readers of Cormac McCarthy, John Steinbeck and Deadwood with a little less swearing.” Since this was also on of my BEA Librarian’s Shout & Share picks, I naturally think it’s a brilliant selection.
New York Magazine — Fall Books Preview: The Twenty — Tending toward the literary, this may be the only preview that picks the Booker short-listed “hall-of-mirrors picaresque,” C by Tom McCarthy (Knopf).