coalescent: (Default)
Niall ([personal profile] coalescent) wrote2007-06-07 07:26 pm

As Others See Us Of The Day

Noodling around on Amazon, I stumble upon the paperback of Lydia Millet's Oh Pure and Radiant Heart. It does not say "nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award" on the cover; instead, the uncredited "synopsis" concludes:
"Oh Pure and Radiant Heart" is no more a SF novel than "The Time-Traveller's Wife". Instead, it is a powerful and original fiction of responsibility and guilt, today's America, and the peculiar terrors of our nuclear world.

However, customers who bought this item also bought Gradisil, Nova Swing, and Hav (and the paperback for the latter carries an Ursula le Guin blurb, which suggests they're not ignoring the sf market, at least). Ha.

[identity profile] secritcrush.livejournal.com 2007-06-07 06:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Ignore my nonsensical commitude ... there is no one behind this curtain.

[identity profile] coalescent.livejournal.com 2007-06-07 06:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Dammit! I was about to reply to that. :-)

[identity profile] secritcrush.livejournal.com 2007-06-07 06:42 pm (UTC)(link)
In the like 15 seconds before I retracted? (You can comment on the general thought if you want - I started to write it up and then thought "hmmm I ought to be sure it the other is a romance/sf hybrid too and then accidentally posted when I meant to post to celia's blog because I was writing up another comment simultaneously.)

But I do stand by the thought that if you can appeal to a huge market or a small one (because the huge market will be offput by appeals to the large one the small market will read it anyway, you go for the big market - that's just sense.)

[identity profile] coalescent.livejournal.com 2007-06-07 06:44 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh, absolutely. I just think that if you marketed Oh Pure and Radiant Heart to romance readers they might get a bit of a shock. :)

[identity profile] secritcrush.livejournal.com 2007-06-07 06:44 pm (UTC)(link)
appeals to the small one, not large one and stick an and in there.