In response to Monday’s
series-starting post, Matt Goguen writes,
“Oprah's Book Club definitely deserves a mention here. It has definitely been a
catapult for many authors, living and deceased. In addition to the Jonathan
Franzen controversy, there was a well-known controversy around the book, A Million
Little Pieces which was first publicized as a
memoir but soon found to be near-complete fabrication.”
Matt follows up Tuesday’s post on
Christian fiction, writing “I'm sincerely glad you mentioned the Left Behind series! I haven't read them
personally but I did know a lot of born-again Christians in my area who have.
They were big fans and it's very important to acknowledge the popularity of
those books, even if they were not as ‘mainstream’ (how is 100 million copies
sold not mainstream?) as Twilight.”
Heidi Kim also follows
up Tuesday’s post to remind us also to consider “Christian-themed [fiction],
like Dan Brown.”
Irene Martyniuk follows up
Thursday’s post on guilty pleasures, writing “about the genre of ‘war porn’
that has been around, I’m sure, but I’ve been ensnared through Afghanistan. Too
much to say here except that I can only read one bit every so often because
these best sellers are so mind numbing in their xenophobia and misogyny (Vince Flynn is the main offender). I also wanted to mention Harlequin
romances—much studied but I got into the Sheikh side of it in December, even
read The Sheik which was the basis for the Valentino hit
movie.” She also highlights a recently
scholarly work that deals with those topics, Hsu-Ming
Teo’s Desert Passions.
On Twitter, Thomas Ruys
Smith passes along info about his new
co-edited collection on American popular fiction, Must Read:
Rediscovering American Bestsellers from Charlotte
Temple to The Da Vinci Code (2012).
Next series
starts Monday,
Ben
PS. So what do
you think?
Just finished re-reading Chuck Klosterman's _Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa-Puffs_. Might be up your alley. Klosterman, who has written for Spin, Village Voice, and the "hipster" crowd validates the use of deconstruction on topics as lofty as _Saved By The Bell_. Not intending to be glib, he actually VALIDATES the use of that lens on those texts! It's hilarious, insightful and a fun read. May want to check it out, but I fear it's not in your topic.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment! I think I've read parts of that--a Val Kilmer piece, for instance; maybe it's in a different collection--and do find Klosterman to be a pretty compelling pop culture AmericanStudier. I'll give the whole thing a read, and I appreciate the recommendation!
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