But before I leave I want to encourage all of you who enjoy following ToB each year, especially those of you who, like me, use it as a great outside the box suggestion tool, to support the sponsor Field Notes. I made a purchase during the tournament last year and then this Fall I actually became a subscriber to their quarterly box.
ToB is fun and useful. As I describe below, you can use it to make suggestions to readers and build displays. And it is extremely interactive. Let's help make sure it keeps coming year after year.
I also want to explicitly mention that just being on the ToB list-- any year-- makes all of these books a good readalike option for each other. Take me, every year [without fail] some of my favs from the year before end up in the ToB. This year, two of my professed favorite books from last year, My Sister the Serial Killer and There There are in the running. It happens year after year. I know I am not the only one because I see similar thought expressed in the comments.
There is more about how to use the ToB as a RA tool below. It is a great way to recapture your love of books and reading. Spend some time each day reading the judge's comments. Whether you agree or not, whether you have read the books in question or not, it is really nourishing to your story loving soul.
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WEDNESDAY, MARCH 7, 2018
Your Annual Reminder-- The Tournament of Books Starts Today!
With ToB we also get the most diverse list of “best books” you will see anywhere, both diverse in authorship and genre. With ToB you not only learn about great books and why they are wonderful, but you also learn about the judges themselves, also a very diverse group of people throughout the publishing industry.
Each “battle” has a full write up which gets to the heart of the two books’ appeal and structure. These essays give us valuable information on who would like the book and why. Readalikes are also often mentioned.
Oh and the comments. The readers who follow along religiously and have entire discussions about each pairing of books for pages and pages are THE BEST. Following just the comments is like reading a novel itself.
And don’t forget the back list. 13 previous years of backlist tourneys to be exact. Each with their own full bank of the above mentioned information and more! Every single page of ToB has the links to every past year [bottom right].
There is plenty here to make a display for “March Madness,” and The Morning News did all the work for you. You can even print out a bracket for your displays.
Click here for every ToB post on RA for All
1 comment:
I discovered A Terrible Country from this short list and it is now my favorite from the list. It is a humorous, smart multicultural novel/immigrant story. It just got knocked out though, and probably won't come back as a Zombie. I think There There has a good shot at winning. I also think My Sister, Serial will make it to the finals.
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