Do large book reviews result in more book sales?
4 March 2022
Since 2012 the Stella Count has been analysing the number, and length, of book reviews published across twelve Australian publications. These periodicals include regional and national newspapers, magazines, and journals.
Reporting of the counts for the two most recent years — being 2019 and 2020 — has been delayed by COVID imposed restrictions, but they have shown for the first time that reviews of books written by women, has exceeded the fifty percent mark for the first time since the Stella Count commenced.
While on the surface it appears there is finally some parity in book reviews between the genders, being published in the twelve surveyed publications, there is a significant caveat. This comes down to the length of the reviews. While more than half of small and medium sized reviews critiqued the work of women in the 2019 and 2020 period, when it came to large reviews, books by men remained in the majority.
As far as I can tell, the Stella Count only looks at print publications, though I assume these reviews are cross-posted to their online counterparts. While using established periodicals makes for a consistent benchmark to measure comparisons over time, I’m guessing these numbers would be quite different if social media reviews were — somehow — to be included.
The value — and prestige even — of large reviews cannot, and should not, be dismissed, but I wonder what the conversion rate, if you like, of large reviews to book purchases is, compared to small and medium reviews. Research tell us people take more time to assimilate longer articles (consisting of a thousand words or more), than they do shorter, or small and medium, sized write-ups.
This is possibly because large reviews contain more information, and readers perhaps feel better informed if they are making a decision to spend money. If I were making a big purchase, such as a car, I would read as many long-form, in depth articles, about the vehicle I was interested in as I could, but buying a novel would be different.
I tend to read several small book reviews published on social media, and possibly a couple of small to medium periodical articles, before deciding what to do. That way I’m able to get a range of opinions, and quickly, rather than relying on the thoughts of a single reviewer.
Might others of the TL;DR generation agree with me?
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Australian soap opera Neighbours coming to an end
4 March 2022
After months of speculation, it’s official, long running Australian television soap opera, Neighbours, is coming to an end after thirty-seven years. The call was made after the soap’s production company Fremantle, were unable to find another broadcaster in the United Kingdom to screen the show.
Ironically the only time I ever saw Neighbours was when I lived in the United Kingdom for a few years. There was a curious — to me at least — ritual at one of the places I worked at, where many of the staff would take their lunch breaks a little later than usual so they could watch Neighbours. My colleagues would assemble in a meeting room and look at the afternoon screening on the wall mounted TV, while engaging in animated banter about what was happening.
I’m a little surprised the producers struggled to find British support for the show though. Neighbours, and its Sydney based counterpart Home and Away, were, at the time, broadcast twice daily, in the early afternoon, and then a few hours later in the early evening. If that’s not a gauge of the popularity of a TV show, what is?
The final episodes will be filmed in June this year, according to reports.
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Turning Red, The Batman, Morbius, The Lost City, and Sonic the Hedgehog 2, are among films whose releases are being delayed in Russia, in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
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Boy Swallows Universe in Netflix screen adaptation
4 March 2022
Boy Swallows Universe, the 2018 semi-autobiographical debut novel by Australian writer Trent Dalton, is set to be adapted into an eight-part series by Netflix.
While details are still scant, it is believed Australian actor and filmmaker Joel Edgerton will be one of the show’s producers, and we can expect to see it on screens sometime in 2023, or 2024.
This is huge news for fans of Dalton’s book.
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Build, a book by Tony Fadell, co-inventor of the iPhone
3 March 2022
To stoke the collective oblong obsession. American engineer and designer Tony Fadell who invented the iPod, and co-invented the iPhone, has written a book, Build, which is being published in May. This is surely a must read for iPod and iPhone aficionados. The story behind the development of both products, especially the iPhone, is fascinating, especially if this perspective by John Gruber at Daring Fireball is anything to go by.
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Beware HR 6819 is a vampire star
3 March 2022
HR 6819 is a binary star about 1120 light years from Earth. So far so good, binary stars are a dime a dozen in the Milky Way. But one member of the duo — though some astronomers speculate HR 6819 may be a three star system — which is about four times the size of the Sun, is sucking material away from its smaller counterpart. Astronomers have a special name for stars like this: vampire stars.
In binary systems where two stars are close together, it’s not uncommon for one star to “suck” away the atmosphere of the other – a phenomenon sometimes called “stellar vampirism”. The researchers believe they may have observed the immediate aftermath of a stellar vampire attack in HR 6819.
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Why is Russia invading Ukraine?
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Memorable reading suggestions for March 2022
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Naomi Parry Duncan wins Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship 2022
2 March 2022
Blue Mountains based Australian historian and writer Naomi Parry Duncan has been named winner of the 2022 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship.
The fellowship, which is awarded to Australian biography writers, commemorates late British born Australian writer and biographer Hazel Rowley, who died in 2011.
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Understanding Ukraine and Russia, some suggested reading
2 March 2022
For anyone interested in reading more about the present situation in Ukraine, Serhii Plokhii, Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University, recommends five books that explore the history, and relationship, between Ukraine and Russia.
It is a situation that probably could be recognized anywhere in the world — because what we see is the process of disintegration of one of the last world empires. The Russian Empire started to fall apart when the Austro-Hungarian, the Ottoman and other empires were falling apart. The Bolsheviks held it together, but it still fell apart in 1991, almost overnight. Everyone was surprised. It was a miracle that there was no major war or bloodshed. Now we realize that the war was just postponed.
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