Host youre watching booktv on cspan2. Joining us now from chicago and publishes convention is ron charles who is the editor of Washington Post book world. Mr. Charles what do you do for living . Guest i assigned most of the daily reviews to the Washington Post and every wednesday i write my own review. Host how many books a week where. Guest we reviewed 20 books a week. And we get about 150 so must go into the dash lets go so about 20 books a week are reviewed reviewed. Weiss reviewed. Wise why isnt their book section, standalone book section . Guest theres a standalone book section on line but we decided four years ago to spread the reviews out to find more readers. Seemed like a disaster the time to me but i have to admit we do in fact have more readers for book reviews now. We just put them in places that people. More. The old book world the supplement was much beloved but tended to be the section that everyone put aside to read later when they had time and that time never came. Now we are in style and weekend arts section. People see our reviews more. Host what kind of books the review . Guest i tend to review only fiction but we have reviewed a lot of political books, a lot of history, science, biography and we do a lot of Arts Coverage on sundays books about the history of film and theater and that sort of thing. Host why do you stick to fiction mostly . Guest because i dont have to know anything. Host is at the end of your answer . Guest pretty much. If you were to do a Nonfiction Book youd have to be an expert in five days on the subject a critique of history as such and such were fiction i can sit back and say whatever i want. Host do the publishers want to have their books reviewed . Guest they say they do. I think they do. There are fewer book reviews around the country so i think its one of the important venues host jonathan yarbrough. Guest we lost jonathan, colleague for many many years. Every week sometimes twice a week before it got to the post but we still have Michael Dearden though on every thursday another one of our Pulitzer Prizewinning book reviewers. Host ron charles how did you get into this business . Guest i was an english teacher for many years. Still my favorite job but that paper grading was just wearing me down. I thought if i graded one more paper i would kill someone and a students mother suggested i review books instead so i went to a bookstore, bought a book off the new fiction table wrote up a review and send it to the Christian Science monitor and they bought it and asked for more. Host how long were you at the monitor . Guest seven years. I was their book critic in the book editor there. Host can a good review or a bad review cell the book . Guest thats the question we all want the answer to. Theres some Academic Research ive. This as a review as same marginal positive effect on sales but it doesnt apparently matter whether the review is positive or negative. Its just getting the cover in and the name out there. Helps a little bit. I know there are cases where positive reviews have pushed books onto the bestsellers list of when she get there is sort of sticky and you tend to stay there or you. Host will the posts continue to conduct book reviews . Guest yes, i know we will because for the first time in many years added to the book section. Host what are some of the books that are coming out that you are looking forward to . Guest the big one this fall will be about the underground railroad. Imagine the underground railroad before the civil war was an actual railroad underground and everybody thinks its fantastic. And he threw has a huge novel coming out that people are excited about. Robert owen butler the Pulitzer Prize winner has a book coming out that apparently reaches back to his vietnam war days and is supposed to be wonderful too. Host who are some of your go to others . Guest patches always fantastic. I love jonathan franzen. Edna obriens novels are as wonderful. The last book a few weeks ago is just fantastic or they couldnt believe it. I am amazed by the number of fine authors we have in this country and the number we keep producing every year. I hate to say its Better Writing part rams are really good at producing fine fiction writers. Host there are many more books produced that need to review. More and more i think people need direction. They go to the bookstore is just overwhelming. There are so many books so they want to know basically what should i read and its getting harder and harder to justify using a limited space to tell people heres a book youve never heard of, dont read it through those no danger of them finding that book anyhow so i tend to, i feel like it can save peoples time. I want to point people to books that they will enjoy and that they want to read. Host being in washington is it important a lot of faith political books . Disco people do turn to us for that. I think with a lot of expertise in the area. My colleague is a nonfiction editor and a lot of books with the election coming up with all the time. Any books that would impinge on the work government i think we specialize in those books. Host how do you develop your bestsellers list . Guest the bestsellers list is generated but from maryland virginia and that information is given to us and then we filter out some things like textbooks and other things that might show up at certain times of the year. As everyone else does on their bestseller lists to make a coherent event editorial judgment. Host what are some of the bestselling books on washington right now . Guest it doesnt tend to differ that much from the nationalists. Once in that while therell be an event that pushes books up on the list are someone will visit. Some will will come to politics and prose and they will move three will move three and a copy that week and that will move a person up unless but in general the list tracks pretty much the nationalists. So they keep looking at that singapore should switch. It isnt that different. Host ron charles you are here at the publishers convention in chicago. Whats the importance of this . Guest i get to meet a lot of publicist that i talked to by email. They give me good recommendations. Trusted friends even tell me what to look for it. I also get to meet authors which is fun. I can set up future interviews with them. Sometimes i am just a fan and i can get another graph or embarrass myself that kind of thing. Host do you do anything electronic with the book reviews . Guest we tweak them, we facebook them. I tried to do an experiment with mind videos. I have this comic series about books i do once while at the post wants me to start up again. Hello im ron charles you may know me the book critic for the american in response to her previous episode but received dozens of kind messages from all over my grandparents or retirement home. Clearly we are meeting a need. In these hectic times you need book criticism that is fast, fun and incredibly hip. People often ask me how long can you keep this up despite the workload . Its a good question. I mean here we are i dont know how many episodes have been so far but still the show seems just as challenging as it was way back in the beginning. This weeks book is a blockbuster by jonathan franzen. You may have heard about this novel because they chat started long before anyone could buy a per the New York Times ran their version of Jonathan Franzens freedom in 1834. They say its a masterpiece. What is the main . I dont know. I dont reckon anybody knows. Franzen has been on the cover of Time Magazine. You realize what a big deal that is . We are talking the cover of Time Magazine here. Before the book came out president obama was fighting for freedom so was it at all about . The previous bestseller in 2 million when you will feel like you are in familiar territory for the whole story follows the rise and fall of walter and Patty Berg Linda troubled married couple with two children in st. Paul minnesota to its classic franzen a smart take on suburban life. We are trying to figure out where readers are coming to kind of the platform and reach them with book criticism or book news. Like everybody else. Host or you finding success . Guest the book people that see them enjoy them i dont know what the numbers are. On twitter i meet people, readers all over the country and thats fun and facebook too. The l. A. Book review. That has the grace said that it isnt anymore i am very impressed by their quality of interviews because im trying to figure out
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