2010 tob revisit

carolyn kellogg, judging Book of Night Women (Marlon James) v Big Machine (Victor LaValle)

back-date "schedule" this blog post?  to Mar 25, 2010 ~ pm
~ maybe see wh if anyth I posted that day, or around then....... 

am actually posting this ////2015/03//17 bcs went back to that match & was looking this up. while engaged in 2015 Book Tournament.   fvr of int: All the Birds, Singing. Annihilation.

Victor LaValle judged this year ---- and made me happy by giving the nod to Annihilation, which I had found most int when looked through the books, over the book that I most d n feel good about.  // dislike title even enough that here I will just identify as by author Jenny Offill. who is fine.  just, not what I wanted, and the praise bothers me, why? bcs almost what I want, and is what others want.  and I want them to want what I want.  tell me you are like me.  and everybody else tell me you like that telling! //
I liked LaValle's write-up.  which makes me maybe want to give another try to Big Machine.
and he says that he would not blame Offill if she was mad at his choice, as he recalls being mad in 2010 at the judgement of Kellogg:
In 2010, my second novel got to spend some time in the Tournament of Books. After a fun opening round win I lost to Marlon James’s excellent The Book of Night Women.
(he also says James is a good friend.  so probably thinks well of that book; but mad at what Kellogg said about his? maybe her "it was really no contest.")

I find that I did not post tob notes here to dlww, that year apparently.  maybe all to dlcs?   I have had in mind that sometimes have kept note of matches on dlww, sometimes as links on dlcs.
pleasingly, I find that I did at least post this match on 3-25- 2010 dlcs.
two pgmrks. one was just the main tmn.org/tob url (where they feature each current day's match, before the next day moving it to its own match-specific url).  I also pgmrkd that tmn.org/tob url on other occasion(s) other years w general cmmts. so it is precarious: if I go in to edit it, then when click save it shows up as the other pgmrk.  but luckily, at least right now, when I went back to the search of my links for kellogg, cld still see the pgmrk for this match.
so, all the more reason to put here.  to make url-as-dlcs-marked into the onethat works today, have to (just) add /2010/ --

themorningnews.org/tob/2010/the-book-of-night-women-v-big-machine.php themorningnews.org/tob/2010/the-book-of-night-women-v-big-machine-commentary.php TheMorningNews/tob Qrtr Finals: Marlon James 4The Book of Night Women v. 3Big Machine Victor LaValle # Judged by Carolyn Kellogg themorningnews.org
 
re BigMachine: ..Nor can th narrative voice, wh begins w Ricky saying he’s a career janitor working at a bus station. 'I saw that little cream-colored sheet, no bigger than a Post-it, on th floor, in a gray puddle, in filthy stall number three. Better to leave it behind than dip fingers in th muck on that floor. Even wearing gloves didn't..' He dsn’t sound like someone who deals w shit all the time /wow no supposed be a janitor who wld h to clean those stalls every day?!/, he sounds like an amusing novelist. /y ~like my 8th gr story./ The character’s cracks are showing—and that’s in th first five pages. In The BkofNightWomen, th narrative voice rises up & in a frenzy demands attention. Devotion. [first paragr quoted in full /y ok wow.] ..a rhythm of own—how Jamaican slaves spoke 200 yrs ago may be largely lost to hist, but James’s inventn is complete, convincing, & beautiful. /this bk is th star here. runaway ~ will it get past Wolf Hall? hope so. then LetTheGreatWorldSpin.

..cont prvs pgmrk; v good write-up of her judgement by Carolyn Kellogg, LAtimes critic.// Eighteenth-century Jamaica is written fr th inside out, fr basements & kitchens, in fervent conversations btw women named Homer, Gorgon, Circe, & Pallas; at the Montpelier estate, the overseer Jack Wilkins likes Greek mythology. Slave narratives, like Holocaust stories, are supposed to come w some nobility-of-spirit theme. This d n. Lilith, who comes into th world bathed in blood, is both shaped by external violence and empowered by the darkness inside; it’s that least human part of her that enables her to survive. This is troubling & complex, yet not without grace. For all th book’s terrors, there is th beauty in th language, th remarkable Lilith, and th unfolding of a secret history. /ok really read./ The Book of Night Women is stunning. The winner? Marlon James. It was really no contest. //also see cmmntry re JWarner's personal recmmndtns* day before versus az recs.

z1003 books a




////2015/03//17  whoa.  I say above 'like my 8th gr story.  that feels weird, bcs I just noted that in re sth this tournament.  in notes on textedit I think.  // this year have noted there on computer, also in notepad on phone.  and posted some of former in a post here to dlww.  intend to put all here.  incl fr phone, by bringing up on cmptr fr icloud. (or cld email myself).  
anyway it feels weird like maybe this is where I wrote it this year, like came in and added that, but No, bcs this is first I looked in dlcs to see if noted re this judgement.  
so wh did I say it about this year? 
let me think......  (maybe look later) ......  I think it was about the first day's match, re Dvd Mitchell's Bone Clocks, the judge saying that the voice of each of the various narrators sound similar and one or two especially sound like a/the novelist.  and quotes.  and I thought sounded like humor of my "they call me Mouth" story.  hmm. or was this a different book.  bcs Mitchell (over) clever humor like that?  maybe this was in re Brave Man Seven Stories Tall.  well, when find, maybe will come back to this.

also. John Warner's recommendations, this is the year he first did that?  spontaneously in the comments? *  and then maybe it was done as ~ half time show  the next year?  and then-now he has a column in this capacity, for Chgo Tribune: Biblioracle.  and it is his twitter handle.  /and (to think) I was there in the beginning.

* yep, this was the coming-into-being of the Biblioracle:
here 3-25-10, Kevin:  Yesterday 3-25-10 you generously volunteered to recommend books to readers based on the last five books they enjoyed, kicking off an internet phenomenon. (Due to the high-volume demand, the recommendation machine is closed for now, but we’re looking into ways to revive it later.) It was great fun and kind of fascinating to watch.
that yesterday 3-25-10 [Wolf Hall v Anthologist (N Baker), John:Sometimes I think we (meaning me) might be better off leaving the choice of what to read with someone or something else. Which is why I’m thinking of starting a new free service for readers. I will choose your next book for you. In the comments, all you have to do is list the last five books you’ve read and I will tell you what to read next.


Note: this year in cmmtry, someone observed that ^ going by LaValle's link back to his match 3-25-2010, saw that there were only 14 cmmts on that match.  whereas this year 2015 five yrs later, there have been 100+ mostly 200+ each day within hours.  so: 'come a long way' etc.
but!  if look at the day before that, 3-24-2010, there were 333 comments, asking for warner's recommendation based on their list of five books recently read.
so.  not so small a commentariat then.  

_________________________________
Now.  what I was looking this up for (also) in my notes was for the comment-joke re "knocking out of the race"  --  this time, upon going back bcs of LaValle,  read this & recalled how in 2010 I had not understood it, and maybe asked joe & rich etc, and then finally got it? 
this year I again read and did not understand, but this time got it by reading pj's comment (as pj got it having written that).   surprised not to find any note about this already here or in dlcs.

-kerry:  Great decision. I reached a different conclusion, but I am very happy that another judge has done the unusual and taken a definitive stand. Judging is boring when the judge says only: well, they are both great and it was a really tough call so I flipped a coin and book X moves on. Thank you, Carolyn.  This type of gutsy, opinionated judging is what makes the TOB great.

-adam:  I really enjoyed reading the judgement for this one, mainly for being smart and perceptive but also the opening sentence for being unintentionally hilarious: "Oh goody: It falls to me to knock one of two brilliant young black male novelists out of the race."
-pj: Think you misunderstood her comment, Alan: the point is that both writers are young brilliant black men, and Carolyn can only choose one. Hence, she must knock one out of the race.
-And now that I type that I get Alan's joke. Which is now on me.   Anyway: good one!

-adam: Still funny the second time!    // :)