Bad Sex Can Win You a Prize

Well…sort of.

The UK’s Literary Review annually presents its Bad Sex in Fiction Award to an author who has penned the worst sex scene in a novel published in that year. But don’t think the title is reserved for low-rent erotica and cheap paperback romances. The awards tend to single out some of the biggest names in literature for their boner-killing attempts at crafting a serviceable sex scene. Nominees for the distinction have included John Updike, Paulo Coelho, Tom Wolfe (who won in 2004 for a scene from I Am Charlotte Simmons), and Norman Mailer (last year’s winner, whose A Castle in the Forest contains a passage describing a penis as “soft as a coil of excrement” — talk about boner-killer).

Today, the 2008 Bad Sex in Fiction Award was awarded to Rachel Johnson, who faced — pardon the term — stiff competition this year (Updike and Coelho were among her fellow nominees). Johnson’s novel Shire Hell contained the winning passage, which the prize committee singled out for its bizarre collection of animal metaphors (i.e. comparing a character’s tongue to “a cat lapping up a dish of cream so as not to miss a single drop”). 

But Johnson is thrilled with the award, calling it an “absolute honor”. ”I’m not feeling remotely grumpy about it,” she said. The author was present at today’s ceremony and accepted the award — a big plaster foot — from actor Dominic West (The Wire).

Congratulations, Rachel Johnson! (I think.)

 

Story Source  The Guardian  |  Image Source  The Daily Mail

November 25, 2008 | Filed Under Eyes on the Prize, Newsies | 1 Comment 

National Book Award Winners Announced

Last night, the National Book Foundation handed out its yearly awards, among the most prestigious in the literary community.

81-year-old Peter Matthiessen won the fiction prize for Shadow Country, which is actually a revision of a trilogy of novels he released in the 1990s. He previously won the National Book Award in 1979 for the spiritual odyssey The Snow Leopard. “I’m back!” Matthiessen exclaimed; then, referring admirably to his fellow nominees, “And they’re going to be back, too.”

Poet Mark Doty won the poetry prize for his collection Fire to Fire. In his acceptance speech, Doty acknowledged Obama’s election and his own marriage to his longtime male partner. “We are on a path to equality for all Americans and nothing is going to turn us back,” he said.

Nonfiction winner Annette Gordon-Reed won for The Hemingses of Monticello, which traces the family history of Sally Hemings, who had close ties with Thomas Jefferson.

What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell won the award for young people’s literature.

The event was hosted by Eric Bogosian. Winners receive a snazzy medal and $10,000.

Story Source Yahoo | Image Source National Book Foundation

November 20, 2008 | Filed Under Eyes on the Prize, Newsies | 48 Comments 

They’d Like to Thank the Academy….

Holy poopsticks, Readers! Awards season has hit like Sarah Palin at a book-burning bonfire.

On Tuesday, the Booker Prize was awarded to Aravind Adiga for his debut novel The White Tiger. Adiga, 33, is one of the youngest winners in history. The White Tiger is about the son of a rickshaw puller who longs for a better life. It is a “powerful story of the darker side of contemporary India,” HarperCollins editor Karthika V.K. said. Adiga — who Karthika describes as “quiet” and “reclusive” — is also known for a popular column he wrote in The Guardian detailing what it’s like being a bachelor in Mumbai — which is, apparently, a bit of a sketchy thing (single men in Mumbai tend to be looked on rather suspiciously if they don’t work for a huge multinational corporation or have a wife in some far-off land). The Booker is awarded yearly to the best novel by a writer from Britain, Ireland, or a Commonwealth country; previous winners include Iris Murdoch, J.M. Coetzee, and Ian McEwan. The Prize comes with an $87,000 check.

Stateside, the National Book Foundation has named its nominees for the 2008 National Book Award. Here they is!

Fiction

Aleksandar Hemon, The Lazarus Project (Riverhead)
Rachel Kushner, Telex from Cuba (Scribner)
Peter Matthiessen, Shadow Country (Modern Library)
Marilynne Robinson, Home (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Salvatore Scibona, The End (Graywolf Press)

Nonfiction

Drew Gilpin Faust, This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War (Alfred A. Knopf)
Annette Gordon-Reed, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family 
(W.W. Norton & Company)
Jane Mayer, The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals (Doubleday)
Jim Sheeler, Final Salute: A Story of Unfinished Lives (Penguin)
Joan Wickersham, The Suicide Index: Putting My Father’s Death in Order (Harcourt)

Poetry

Frank Bidart, Watching the Spring Festival (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Mark Doty, Fire to Fire: New and Collected Poems (HarperCollins)
Reginald Gibbons, Creatures of a Day (Louisiana State University Press)
Richard Howard, Without Saying (Turtle Point Press)
Patricia Smith, Blood Dazzler (Coffee House Press)

Young People’s Literature

Laurie Halse Anderson, Chains (Simon & Schuster)
Kathi Appelt, The Underneath (Atheneum)
Judy Blundell, What I Saw and How I Lied (Scholastic)
E. Lockhart, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks (Hyperion)
Tim Tharp, The Spectacular Now (Alfred A. Knopf)

The National Book Awards, founded in 1950, celebrate the best of American literature. They will be given out November 19 in New York City.

 

Story Source Yahoo, National Book Foundation  |  Image Source Discovery Education

October 15, 2008 | Filed Under Eyes on the Prize, Newsies | Leave a Comment 

« Previous Page



      WHAT IS A SNARK?




      The Snark is a creature created by Lewis Carroll in his poem "The Hunting of the Snark". To give a proper description of Snarks, one must look no further than Carroll himself, who summed them up in one word: Unimaginable.

      But this much we do know: some have feathers, some have whiskers. Snarks sleep a lot, yet they are an ambitious lot -- with very little sense of humor. They love bathing-machines and tend to bring them wherever they go; they are also handy for striking a light. Snarks live on a far-off island, a place filled with chasms and crags, and are constantly on the lookout for Snark-hunters. Their mortal enemies are hope, care, thimbles and forks.

    • Archives

      • The Book Snark's Pick for Best Book of 2008




      Special web hosting offer - LIMITED TIME ONLY

      PerformancingAds


      Picnik: photo editing awesomeness