How to Predict the Buzziest Books via Book Riot Podcast and How to Help Patrons via Booklist

The April Book Riot new books podcast is all about how to try to predict what the buzziest book is going to be BEFORE it comes out. You can access the podcast and read more at this link, but here are the criteria they came up with to try to make these predictions: 

• Art – Is it good?

• Acclaim – Will it contend for awards and best-of lists?

• Sales – Where’s the money?

• Zeitgeist – What’s the buzz?

I found this list and their discussion about these 4 pillars fascinating on its own, but it also reminded me of  one of the presentations from last month's Booklist Ideas and Practice event: Four Cornerstones of Reader Interest by Heather Booth and Susan Maguire

I posted about the entire event at this link. But for short cut purposes:

• Access the recording at this link
• Access the slides at this link

Booth and Maguire listed the 4 cornerstones as Mood, Availability, Appeal, and Zeitgeist. This idea of buzzy books addressed by Book Riot above is very similar to Zeitgeist which they quickly defined as "The interest of the greater world, the community, friends, media, and more. If you scroll down here on slides you can see a few specific slides for Zeitgeist. And again you can click here to watch the recording and hear them expound on Zeitgeist and how we use it to help readers.

I really wanted to write about this presentation specifically after listening to the Book Riot podcast. The two things taken together really help to demystify the process of us helping readers when they want the buzziest books, especially when those titles seem to come out of nowhere (I'm giving you the side eye,  Theo of Golden).

I hope pairing these two separate but tangential resources helps you as much as it helped me.