When Hoke Norris, a 1951 Nieman Fellow and books editor for the Chicago Sun Times, made his declaration that “Most Books Aren’t Worth Reading” in the June 1965 issue of Nieman Reports, American publishers were putting out an average of 20,000 books a year. In 2010, publishers released an average of 24,000 books every month. With that greater volume, it’s harder than ever to decide to what should be reviewed in the newspaper, much less which books actually are worth reading. Fortunately, Norris writes, “most of the books simply eliminate themselves.” Which ones?
- “At the head of this class—instantly and automatically—stand all books published by the vanity presses.”
- “… the how-to book, whether its pretenses are material or spiritual.”
- “… the autobiographies of movie stars, athletes and other such public personages, as told to someone else.”
- “… the quick superficial book written to exploit a current event or issue.”
- “… the sort of documentary non-fiction book that fancies that it uses the techniques of fiction.”
But along those same lines, some books have to be reviewed for one reason or another, leading to the ultimate conundrum: “We have eliminated many books, but we have a accepted a large number too. Not much space remains. In this space we must crowd somehow the worthy book that is not about a current controversy of compelling interest, that is not by an author who is local or eminent (or both), and that is not affected by other considerations that may make a review necessary. This is where the sweating starts.”
As our Winter 2011 issue—“Writing the Book”—makes clear, journalists and authors are going to continue putting out more and more books, on every conceivable subject, through countless new platforms. The anguish of the book editor continues.
