Because of that, I sympathize with the author to a degree. Handbook reminds me of my first novel efforts, the ones I trunked and will forever more keep trunked. If this had been any other book, I would have declared it Did Not Finish (DNF) in the first few pages. I wanted to judge Handbook with as much fairness as I could, even knowing its history, so I endeavored to read the entire thing. I don’t rate or review any book unless I finish it. I also know that the Goodreads ratings for the book consist of mostly one-star ratings due to the book’s reputation and the sample available on Amazon. As a published author myself, I am well aware of the way that author Lani Sarem and her team manipulated the New York Times list. I received this ebook through the publisher via Netgalley. I don’t like doing negative reviews, but I wanted to present a comprehensive analysis of the book that created so much fuss and furor. Here, for your edification, is my review. The publisher obliged me through the galley site NetGalley. The few excerpts that began to float around Twitter showed the novel to be of… dubious quality. For all that this was a so-called bestseller, almost no one had actually seen the book, much less read it. Some crack reporting by YA Twitter painted a picture that was stranger than fiction (seriously, read that link if you have not). It has been a subject of morbid fascination since it infiltrated the New York Times Bestseller list out of the blue. The book is also getting a high-profile film adaptation with an incredible cast that so far includes Issa Rae, Regina Hall, and Common.If you follow publishing news, you likely recognize the title Handbook for Mortals by one Lani Sarem. This is the exact kind of voice that’s thrilling to see embraced by the largely insular, excessively white YA publishing community. Angie Thomas’ The Hate U Give is borne out of the Black Lives Matter movement, telling the story of a young black girl grappling with issues of police violence.
The problem here is that the book Handbook for Mortals pushed out of the number one spot is the exact sort of book that breaks the mold Sarem claims is holding her back–but this one does so based on its actual merit. Sarem is attempting to paint herself, then, as a deserving outsider who managed to find a road into this tight-knit world of YA cool kids, despite the “unfair bias” that rules the industry.
Big money is going into recycling the same stories and the same voices. And it’s true that the YA lit world–like the publishing world in general–does historically have a diversity problem–a problem that only grows starker when we look at what books reach the eyes of Hollywood studios.
0 kommentar(er)
