American Novelists Beg for Oprah's Book Club Help

[jamotto]

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By Mark Egan

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oprah, save us, we can't get by without you.

That's the message from a group of published and award-winning novelists in an open letter to influential television talk-show host Oprah Winfrey, begging her to resume picking new novels for members of her popular book club.

"There's a widely-held belief that the landscape of literary fiction is now a gloomy place," Word of Mouth, a loose alliance of women's authors, wrote. It said fiction sales began to plummet when the The Oprah Winfrey Book Club went off the air in 2002 and stopped featuring contemporary authors.

"Book Club members stopped buying new fiction, and this changed the face of American publishing," said the letter, which was signed by 158 authors.

Among those signing the letter were Pulitzer Prize winner Jhumpa Lahiri and Amy Tan, author of "The Joy Luck Club." Several male authors also signed.

The letter expressed thanks for Winfrey's contribution to book sales and asked her to "consider focusing, once again, on contemporary writers in your book club."

"The readers need you. And we, the writers, need you," it said. "Oprah Winfrey, we wish you'd come back."

A spokeswoman for Winfrey's company, Harpo Productions, poured cold water on the idea. "There are no plans to change the focus of the book club at this time," she said.

Paula Sharp, an author of four novels and a member of Word of Mouth, said, "Oprah got so many people to read contemporary fiction, in a way nobody else has ever done."

"Getting people to read is about the most important contribution that anyone can make to American society," Sharp told Reuters. "It's a stunning achievement to get 500,00O people to go to bookstores.

Oprah's Book Club began as a segment on Winfrey's talk show in 1996. An Oprah's Book Club logo on a novel's cover helped many of her picks garner sales of more than 1 million copies.

The club became embroiled in controversy in 2001 when Jonathan Franzen publicly objected to the selection of his novel, "The Corrections," and said he feared it might affect his reputation in literary circles. He later said he regretted voicing his reservations.

Winfrey suspended the club in April 2002, saying she would only make occasional recommendations because, "It has become harder and harder to find books on a monthly basis that I feel absolutely compelled to share."

Relaunched in June 2003, the club now picks classics such as John Steinbeck's "East of Eden" and Leo Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina" rather than new books.

Authors complain that with publishers and bookstores consolidating, there are fewer avenues for new authors to break through. Winfrey's book club, they argue, was one of the few developments to bring people back to bookstores in a decade that has seen a steady decline in sales of literary fiction.

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The letter and a list of signatures can be found at http://wordofmouthwriters.org

[Kevin Trotter]

This has to be one of the signs of the End Time, Americans having to have a rich self righteous

megolomaniac tell them what to read! What's next "Oh Oprah! what toilet paper should we use?"

I'm moving to a cave...I am really starting to dislike the Human Condition as it exist right now

[Supreme Cmdr]

LOL!!!

[jamotto]

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Originally posted by Race Bannon IV:

This has to be one of the signs of the End Time, Americans having to have a rich self righteous

megolomaniac tell them what to read! What's next "Oh Oprah! what toilet paper should we use?"

I'm moving to a cave...I am really starting to dislike the Human Condition as it exist right now.

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Well, that's one way to look at it, the other is that Oprah no matter how "rich self righteous megalomaniac" she might be, did do new author's a great service. Without the free advertisement that they would not have gotten otherwise many great author's would never have been realized. I mean if your not Dean Koontz or Stephen King or somebody some publisher thinks is going to be the next bestseller your out of luck.

[Guest]

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Originally posted by Race Bannon IV:

This has to be one of the signs of the End Time, Americans having to have a rich self righteous

megolomaniac tell them what to read! What's next "Oh Oprah! what toilet paper should we use?"

I'm moving to a cave...I am really starting to dislike the Human Condition as it exist right now

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LOL, you state the truth, no if's and's or but's about it....

I'll look around, I am sure that my daughters and your daughter would get along fine....

Now, where shall I start looking for a cave?

[Kevin Trotter]

To Jag..Anyplace warm and human free

To Jammato.. My statement is aimed more at the pathetic lot of aggressively stupid people incapable of making decisions for themselves. I realize that many novelist benefitted from Oprah's intellectual largess, but it is sad that in a country where there is a lending library in every community that so few people take advantage of them. Most have book clubs, discussion groups and book signings by published authors FREE of charge.

I guess I am weary of our overall intellectual flabbiness. Have we become so lemming like we need someone to tell us what to read? I'd love to see what Flannery O'Connor, Dorothy Parker or Mark Twain would say about making Oprah list. Parker once cautioned her husband about his drinking by saying " Don't become the town drunk darling, not in New York,"

They dont make em like that anymore.

[jamotto]

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Originally posted by JUDGExKTF:

Free advertisement, uhu, all I see is big business. You want your book to be a bestseller? No problem but its gonne cost ya....

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to my knowledge the book club don't charge a dime.

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IMHO Great author's are measured by the quality of their books, not the sales figures of those books. And this certainly applies to the opera bookclub thing: "Simple Opera says: Buy this book!" and TJACHING! milions of people own the book. Now does this make it a good book???

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I think it goes more like this. She says "Buy this book!. I Liked it because...." millions of people agree that does sound like a good book, much better than what barnes and noble has in it's MUST BUY section (right now it's a book by Goldie Hawn). People go out and find the book, if they like it they buy it.

[jamotto]

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Originally posted by Race Bannon IV:

[QB]To Jamotto.. My statement is aimed more at the pathetic lot of aggressively stupid people incapable of making decisions for themselves. I realize that many novelist benefitted from Oprah's intellectual largess, but it is sad that in a country where there is a lending library in every community that so few people take advantage of them. Most have book clubs, discussion groups and book signings by published authors FREE of charge.

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Good point, maybe a lack of time has to do with this, not so much intellectual flabbiness.

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Have we become so lemming like we need someone to tell us what to read?

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No one can make you read anything. Oprah could talk til she turned blue, but she can show there are other books out there besides books by Goldie Hawn or James Patterson.

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I'd love to see what Flannery O'Connor, Dorothy Parker or Mark Twain would say about making Oprah list. Parker once cautioned her husband about his drinking by saying " Don't become the town drunk darling, not in New York,"

They dont make em like that anymore.

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I think by now Samuel Clemens is too tired to do anymore rolling over.