Tournament of Books discussion

Oct 14 - The Orphan Master's Son vs. The Good Lord Bird
Oct 15 - Station Eleven vs. The Sellout
Oct 16 - The Underground Railroad vs. Fever Dream
Oct 19 -My Sister, the Serial Killer vs. Normal People

we move to the right half of the bracket with Orphan Master v. Good Lord Bird! I love that no one has been 100% right so far in their predictions :)
https://themorningnews.org/tob/superr...

Tomorrow's going to be interesting...I'm guessing The Sellout will win, but it'll be very judge dependent. (I think Sellout is a better book, although I really liked Station Eleven and it has a much more absorbing plot.)

And talk about books being affected by when you read them!!!! The Sellout would be even more uncomfortable today. Reading it now I don't think I'd be able to let myself be amused by the humor, and I don't think I could have stood to read Station Eleven at all now.

Today's discussion was fascinating! I knew there was plenty of criticism of The Orphan Master's Son, but for whatever reason I thought there would be more love for it. I'm ok sticking with my love for it, and ok if others don't feel the same.

I don't get the commentariat. never have.

This three book run was a lot of fun because it was the first years I followed and my favorite book won every time. The Orphan Master’s Son critique from the commentariat has always been so interesting because it’s always felt so nebulous. It’s hard to say a book is so wrong about the truth of how North Korea is when we know so little about the country, and even less about different lives within that country. We get so little info, and even that info is coming from generally similar experiences, it’s not a diaspora by any means.

Adam Johnson did at least go to North Korea. It's my favorite book ever from the ToB. It's a satire where the exaggerations are hard to distinguish from how it really is, where every outrageous thing feels perfectly plausible.

I read The Good Lord Bird this year for the first time. It was also a 5-star read for me, so I wasn't going to be surprised by any result. I was surprised she wasn't moved by either of them. But, I've come to realize that there are a lot of factors in how I feel about a book that may have little to do with the words on the page: expectations, mood while reading, assigned instead of chosen, no time so read in short bursts instead of longer sustained reading.

I remember loving Good Lord Bird and liking Orphan Master's Son. Bummed a bit that GLB is out of contention, but at least it has a semi-popular tv adaptation now?

https://themorningnews.org/tob/superr...

Bretnie wrote: "Today's discussion was fascinating! I knew there was plenty of criticism of The Orphan Master's Son, but for whatever reason I thought there would be more love for it. I'm ok sticking with my love ..."

Yeah, I'm still a fan of The Orphan Master's Son too! I feel like with Pulitzer award winners, either I agree 100% and not many others do, or I disagree 100 % and everyone else loves that winner.
I will be happy if Orphan Master's Son or The Sellout wins the ToB... if not either of those, hopefully Cloud Atlas.
Edited to add: I have not read the judgement yet today, so maybe I should hold my tongue about The Sellout right now, haha

All my faves are getting taken down *sob*
And with no hope of zombie resurrection, it stings even more. The only saving grace is that the judgments have been excellent.
If Underground Railroad does not win tomorrow I will absolutely need the weekend to recover.

Bracket contest: Two tied with 5 and opposite books for tomorrow's match.

I don't really have a horse to back in tomorrow's battle, but I do hope My Sister beats out Normal People next week.

I'm so interested that someone chose Fever Dream over Underground! For me, it's no competition, and I never really understood how Fever Dream won, except that it did swallow me while I was reading it, and I still shiver whenever I think about it. But UR haunted me in a much more profound way.

Are Rosecrans and Andrew really doing the judging? I wonder how that's going to work.

That's interesting. Looks like Andrew loved Fever Dream. Rosencrans not as much.

https://themorningnews.org/tob/2018/f...

I enjoyed The Underground Railroad more, but put Fever Dream moving forward in my bracket since sometimes the ToB is predictably unpredictable, I guess?

Elizabeth wrote: "I'm so interested that someone chose Fever Dream over Underground! For me, it's no competition, and I never really understood how Fever Dream won, except that it did swallow me while I was reading ..."

It'll certainly be an interesting matchup tomorrow!

I'm one of the crazy fans of Fever Dream, so I'm bracing myself for the collective rage if Fever Dream does win. People seem to hate the books that I love this week!

UR vs FD! https://themorningnews.org/tob/superr...

How anticlimactic!

I wonder what happened....

I loved reading Rosecrans and Andrew’s thoughts, though.

I just looked at the bracket and realized that I never picked the final winner!! I remember thinking "let me stew on this a bit" and I'll get back to it. Geez I wonder if you can win with out picking a winner! lol

Anyone we can ask for more...information? I mean as long as it’s not intrusive into personal lives. I looked up the judge on twitter and she seems to use it to talk about the Dodgers almost exclusively

I am super bummed Fever Dream won’t be the underdog again this tourney!

I’ve been trying to piece it together... there was a “trans lives matter” comment that made me worry the judge was trans and had been harmed, but another comment made me think the opposite and I found this article. But it’s from years ago... So if they asked a judge to step down from providing full commentary because of harmful/hateful things they’ve written, shouldn’t they have just found a replacement judge a few months ago? I don’t know, it might be something else going on, but what she wrote is unacceptable. https://newrepublic.com/article/14070...

Lauren wrote: "I’ve been trying to piece it together... there was a “trans lives matter” comment that made me worry the judge was trans and had been harmed, but another comment made me think the opposite and I fo..."

I was the one who made the comment about the judge of today's decision being transphobic in previous writings. I probably should have been clearer. I just didn't want to rain on anyone's parade on a joyful, reflective day for the tournament. I wanted to make it clear here that I'm definitely not sure that her previous op-eds were the reason why her judgment didn't appear. Rather, my comment was meant to convey that I was glad we didn't have to read whatever she wrote. I was disappointed to see that she was invited to participate in the first place.

Maybe we'll learn more about her absence in the finals when she would have had the chance to write a mini-judgment for her winning choice.

Ah, interesting. All’s for the best, then. I wonder if, after the judges were announced, someone looked her up, saw some of what she’d written, and let TOB know...By then there probably wouldn’t have been time for a replacement (especially because the replacement would have been required to reach the same judgment, to retain future judgments.)

Zachary wrote: I was the one who made the comment about the judge of today's decision being transphobic in previous writings...."

Thanks for letting us know. I'd never heard of her and certainly didn't know she was a TERFy transphobe. It sucks to bear the burden of knowing that and not feel at liberty to disclose it. I appreciate you letting us know.

If that was enough for them not to share the judgment, I wonder why they asked her to judge in the first place. Other folks in the commentariat seemed to know about it, too. Unless the tourney organizers only found out about it once it was too late...or, maybe she said something in the judgment? I wish they'd let us know because honestly the not knowing and the speculating is distracting.

Thanks for clarifying, Zachary (and welcome back to the group ;). I think we can try to collectively act as a check on these things to alert the organizers when there are problematic folks they're planning to include in the tournament. Hopefully in the future we can catch these issues before they're announced so we don't get into this awkwardness. And personally I'd appreciate some transparency, so we can discuss as a community how we do not support uplifting the voices of transphobic and otherwise harmful folks in the industry.

Thanks for the link and explanation. I’m glad the ToB didn’t give her a platform. Bob’s outing her as a Dodgers fan was enough for me tbh.

Really really hoping MStSK takes it tomorrow!

Monday surprise

Insanity!

I put My Sister in my bracket, but definitely loved Normal People more. The next judge tore the NP miniseries apart in the Guardian, so likely we are at the end of its run when it comes against Underground Railroad (rightfully so) but I will miss the gnashing of teeth in the commentariat.

only 2 folks in the bracket picked NP to win this round!
https://themorningnews.org/tob/superr...

I am destroyed. The only thing that is helping me get through this disappointment is that I'm still riding the high of watching The Trial of the Chicago 7 last night. I know it's not book-related (what a great book it would be though!), but everyone should watch it. Highly relevant and moving.

Amy wrote: "only 2 folks in the bracket picked NP to win this round!"

2 more than picked it to win 2020 ToB!

Ugh, I liked Normal People fine but My Sister was brilliant and different! Just ugh to today's judgment.

I picked it because I haven't understood its staying power and felt it would continue to prevail.

EDIT: I picked it to win the ROUND not the the thing.

Definitely a shocker!

So many of my favorites are out that I'm not sure who I'm rooting for anymore! Go Cloud Atlas?

Jason wrote: "Bracket contest: Two tied with 5 and opposite books for tomorrow's match."
And now you're the front-runner, Jason!

Kyle wrote: "I don't really have a horse to back in tomorrow's battle, but I do hope My Sister beats out Normal People next week."

And now we hang our heads in sadness.

Bob wrote: "Zachary wrote: I was the one who made the comment about the judge of today's decision being transphobic in previous writings...."

Thanks for letting us know. I'd never heard of her and certainly d..."

So back in 2017, she wrote this https://www.theamericanconservative.c...

Here's one response from immediately after
https://newrepublic.com/article/14070...

I have no idea whether any of that contributed at all to the lack of a judgment.

Ack! Today's decision hurts. I disagreed with every single thing the judge said in dismissing MStSK. It is a slim book, yes, but it is not slight. The depths are there.
*Sob*