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Thread: The Great American Read

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    Default The Great American Read

    https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/...tv-series.html

    The Great American Read, an ambitious eight-episode documentary series that PBS has just announced, will explore the place of reading in American culture. The show, which is set to start airing in the summer of 2018, will kickoff with a two-hour program that will reveal a list of America’s 100 best-loved books.

    The inaugural episode of the series, set for May 2018, will feature the list of 100 best-loved books, chosen by the public and by a panel of literary experts. The final program in the fall will unveil a Top Ten list of America's best-loved books, culminating in the first-ever nation-wide vote to reveal America's single best-loved book of all.

    Funded by the Public Broadcasting System and produced by the TV production house, Nutopia, The Great American Read will marshal the entire PBS network in a multiplatform campaign. The TV series will be supported by social media campaigns and community reading groups, in addition to testimonials and appearances by figures from the worlds of entertainment, sports, news and literature.

    Voting by the public on the list of best-loved books will take place throughout the summer of 2018. The show will air thematic episodes ranging from “Being American,” and “Heroes,” to “Growing Up.” It will also feature interviews with celebrities and ordinary Americans about their passion for books and the role of reading in their lives.

    Nutopia CEO Jane Root said she brought the idea for the Great American Read to PBS chief programming executive Beth Hoppe, after working on a similar and successful program for the BBC in the U.K. “It ended up really increasing book sales for the summer it ran," Root said, who credited Hoppe with keeping the project alive at PBS.

    The initial list of 100 Best Loved Books, according to Bob Kirsh, executive producer of The Great American Read, were chosen through a demographically representative survey of ordinary Americans conducted via YouGov, a polling organization. Based on the question “What is your best-loved novel?,” the YouGov survey produced a list of 1,200 titles.

    Working with the literary agency Aevitas Creative Management and with PBS, Nutopia has recruited a volunteer panel of “respected industry professionals including heads of not-for-profit literary organizations, educators, a librarian and members of the literary press," Kirsh said. The literary panel, Kirsh continued, will review the final list of 100 books to ensure it is representative of the full range of American literature. The panel of literary experts will be revealed at the time of the broadcast.

    “It is important to reiterate that every title on our top 100 list was indeed initially chosen by the American public,” Kirsh said. "That’s what makes this national campaign exciting—there will truly be something for everyone.”
    Some King stuff should be on there, I would imagine.

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    I hope so! Nevertheless, this sounds pretty interesting.
    Only the gentle are ever really strong.

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    The process seems bogus. 1,200 titles chose my fans, of which a panel of "experts" takes over and culls it down to 100 - there will be a classics bent for sure.

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    What books would be on your list?
    What books do you think will make this list?

  5. #5
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    https://www.aberdeennews.com/enterta...c518ce258.html
    Earlier this year, Public Broadcasting Service issued a list of the top 100 fiction books and series that have shaped American reading.

    Starting Tuesday night, host Meredith Vieira will be counting down all 100 before revealing America’s favorite book in an eight-part series called “The Great American Read” on PBS.

    Also starting Tuesday: a chance for the public to vote to decide the top book. Polls will be open on the program’s website and on social media channels.

    Not all of the books were written by American authors or even take place in part in the U.S. To qualify, a book just had to be translated into English.

    All 100 books are available at K.O. Lee Aberdeen Public Library, said Cara Romeo, assistant director. There’s at least one hard copy of each book, and more popular books might be available as CD audiobooks, downloadable audiobooks and e-books.

    When the list was released, Romeo said library staff combed it and ordered any that were missing from the collection.

    The 100 books were selected by publishing industry professionals. Authors can only have one book or series on the list to increase diversity, according to information on the PBS website.

    The grand finale revealing the No. 1 book will air in October.

    The 100 contenders

    • “1984” by George Orwell.

    • “A Confederacy of Dunces” by John Kennedy Toole.

    • “A Prayer For Owen Meany” by John Irving.

    • “A Separate Peace” by John Knowles.

    • “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” by Betty Smith.

    • “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” by Mark Twain.

    • “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho.

    • “Alex Cross Mysteries” (series) by James Patterson.

    • “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” by Lewis Carroll.

    • “Americanah Chimamanda” by Ngozi Adichie.

    • “And Then There Were None” by Agatha Christie.

    • “Anne of Green Gables” by Lucy Maud Montgomery.

    • “Another Country” by James Baldwin.

    • “Atlas Shrugged” by Ayn Rand.

    • “Beloved” by Toni Morrison.

    • “Bless Me, Ultima” by Rudolfo Anaya.

    • “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak.

    • “The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao” by Junot Díaz.

    • “The Call Of The Wild” by Jack London.

    • “Catch-22” by Joseph Heller.

    • “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger.

    • “Charlotte’s Web” by E. B. White.

    • “The Chronicles of Narnia” (series) by C.S. Lewis.

    • “Clan of the Cave Bear” by Jean M. Auel.

    • “Coldest Winter Ever” by Sister Souljah.

    • “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker.

    • “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexandre Dumas.

    • “Crime and Punishment” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

    • “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” by Mark Haddon.

    • “The Da Vinci Code” by Dan Brown.

    • “Don Quixote” by Miguel de Cervantes.

    • “Dona Barbara” by Romulo Gallegos.

    • “Dune” by Frank Herbert.

    • “Fifty Shades Of Grey” (series) by E. L. James.

    • “Flowers In The Attic” by V.C. Andrews.

    • “Foundation” (series) by Isaac Asimov.

    • “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley.

    • “Game of Thrones” (series) by George R. R. Martin.

    • “Ghost” by Jason Reynolds.

    • “Gilead” by Marilynne Robinson.

    • “The Giver” by Lois Lowry.

    • “The Godfather” by Mario Puzo.

    • “Gone Girl” by Gillian Flynn.

    • “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell.

    • “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck.

    • “Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens.

    • “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

    • “Gulliver’s Travels” by Jonathan Swift.

    • “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood.

    • “Harry Potter” (series) by J.K. Rowling.

    • “Hatchet” (series) by Gary Paulsen.

    • “Heart Of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad.

    • “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett.

    • “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy” by Douglas Adams.

    • “The Hunger Games” (series) by Suzanne Collins.

    • “The Hunt For Red October” by Tom Clancy.

    • “The Intuitionist” by Colson Whitehead.

    • “Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison.

    • “Jane Eyre” by Charlotte Brontë.

    • “The Joy Luck Club” by Amy Tan.

    • “Jurassic Park” by Michael Crichton.

    • “Left Behind” (series) by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins.

    • “The Little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery.

    • “Little Women” by Louisa May Alcott.

    • “Lonesome Dove” by Larry McMurtry.

    • “Looking for Alaska” by John Green.

    • “The Lord of the Rings” (series) by J.R.R. Tolkien.

    • “The Lovely Bones” by Alice Sebold.

    • “The Martian” by Andy Weir.

    • “Memoirs of a Geisha” by Arthur Golden.

    • “Mind Invaders” by Dave Hunt.

    • “Moby-Dick” by Herman Melville.

    • “The Notebook” by Nicholas Sparks.

    • “One Hundred Years of Solitude” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

    • “Outlander” (series) by Diana Gabaldon.

    • “The Outsiders” by S. E. Hinton.

    • “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde.

    • “The Pilgrim’s Progress” by John Bunyan.

    • “The Pillars of The Earth” by Ken Follett.

    • “Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen.

    • “Ready Player One” by Ernest Cline.

    • “Rebecca” by Daphne du Maurier.

    • “The Shack” by William P. Young.

    • “Siddhartha” by Hermann Hesse.

    • “The Sirens of Titan” by Kurt Vonnegut.

    • “The Stand” by Stephen King.

    • “The Sun Also Rises” by Ernest Hemingway.

    • “Swan Song” by Robert R. McCammon.

    • “Tales of The City” (series) by Armistead Maupin.

    • “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston.

    • “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe.

    • “This Present Darkness” by Frank. E. Peretti.

    • “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee.

    • “The Twilight Saga” (series) by Stephenie Meyer.

    • “War and Peace” by Leo Tolstoy.

    • “Watchers” by Dean Koontz.

    • “The Wheel of Time” (series) by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson.

    • “Where the Red Fern Grows” by Wilson Rawls.

    • “White Teeth” by Zadie Smith.

    • “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë.

    How many have you read? Visit pbs.org/the-great-american-read/quiz/ to find out.

  6. #6
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    50 shades of grey and the twilight series. LOL in the top 100 of all time?? The left behind series?
    All that's left of what we were is what we have become.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jon View Post
    50 shades of grey and the twilight series. LOL in the top 100 of all time?? The left behind series?
    Maybe for the wives and daughters of NASCAR drivers?

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    It's not technically anything like a critical Top 100. They're positioning it more like 100 of America's most favorite novels.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jon View Post
    50 shades of grey and the twilight series. LOL in the top 100 of all time?? The left behind series?
    I watched this and they said the vote is going to be for America's most beloved book. It is basically a popularity contest so I expect Harry Potter or something like it to win.

    The real reason they are doing this is to try to get more people to read. They had a lot of celebrities and authors talking up their favorites to try to get people to read them. Obviously no one has enough time to read everything that they haven't before fall so they can properly vote especially with whole series listed. However if they can get a good number of people picking up a few books to read over the summer then they have succeeded.

  11. #11
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    I watched and really enjoyed it. It did make me want to read several of the titles on the list that I have not gotten to yet.

    I would vote for...

    Crime and Punishment
    Moby-Dick
    The Great Gatsby
    Catch-22
    1984
    Heart of Darkness
    The Picture of Dorian Gray
    Beloved
    Gone Girl
    The Sun Also Rises
    To Kill A Mockingbird
    Wuthering Heights
    Heart of Darkness
    Harry Potter
    The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao
    The Cather in the Rye
    The Call of the Wild
    The Stand

    I'm debating Ready Player one. I've only gotten to Book three of The Fire and Ice series which, isn't even completed yet so it's weird to vote for that IMO. I wish they had included The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn instead of Tom Sawyer. I also wish my favorite book, Lolita, had been included but it is still probably way too controversial for something like this.

    Since the results are in the Fall, hopefully I can get a chance to read several that I haven't yet.


    One last gripe. I get that some of my favorite writers are not as widely read these days, but I really wish some

    Faulkner
    Joyce
    Oates
    McCarthy
    Pynchon
    Roth
    Rice

    had been included as well.

  12. #12
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    Did y'all watch the first episode? Sorry, I forgot to bump the thread but my DVR remembered. Here's a trailer for the next episode:


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    The Stand came in #24

    It was cool seeing Mccammon, Tan and other authors presenting. A fun show and interesting results.

  14. #14
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    Here's the full list:

    https://ew.com/books/2018/10/23/to-k...american-read/
    1. To Kill a Mockingbird
    2. Outlander (Series)
    3. Harry Potter (Series)
    4. Pride and Prejudice
    5. Lord of the Rings
    6. Gone with the Wind
    7. Charlotte’s Web
    8. Little Women
    9. Chronicles of Narnia
    10. Jane Eyre
    11. Anne of Green Gables
    12. Grapes of Wrath
    13. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
    14. Book Thief
    15. Great Gatsby
    16. The Help
    17. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
    18. 1984
    19. And Then There Were None
    20. Atlas Shrugged
    21. Wuthering Heights
    22. Lonesome Dove
    23. Pillars of the Earth
    24. Stand
    25. Rebecca
    26. A Prayer for Owen Meany
    27. Color Purple
    28. Alice in Wonderland
    29. Great Expectations
    30. Catcher in the Rye
    31. Where the Red Fern Grows
    32. Outsiders
    33. The Da Vinci Code
    34. The Handmaid’s Tale
    35. Dune
    36. The Little Prince
    37. Call of the Wild
    38. The Clan of the Cave Bear
    39. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy
    40. The Hunger Games
    41. The Count of Monte Cristo
    42. The Joy Luck Club
    43. Frankenstein
    44. The Giver
    45. Memoirs of a Geisha
    46. Moby Dick
    47. Catch 22
    48. Game of Thrones (series)
    49. Foundation (series)
    50. War and Peace
    51. Their Eyes Were Watching God
    52. Jurassic Park
    53. The Godfather
    54. One Hundred Years of Solitude
    55. The Picture of Dorian Gray
    56. The Notebook
    57. The Shack
    58. A Confederacy of Dunces
    59. The Hunt for Red October
    60. Beloved
    61. The Martian
    62. The Wheel of Time (series)
    63. Siddhartha
    64. Crime and Punishment
    65. The Sun Also Rises
    66. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
    67. A Separate Peace
    68. Don Quixote
    69. The Lovely Bones
    70. The Alchemist
    71. Hatchet (series)
    72. Invisible Man
    73. The Twilight Saga (series)
    74. Tales of the City (series)
    75. Gulliver’s Travels
    76. Ready Player One
    77. Left Behind (series)
    78. Gone Girl
    79. Watchers
    80. The Pilgrim’s Progress
    81. Alex Cross Mysteries (series)
    82. Things Fall Apart
    83. Heart of Darkness
    84. Gilead
    85. Flowers in the Attic
    86. Fifty Shades of Grey
    87. The Sirens of Titan
    88. This Present Darkness
    89. Americanah
    90. Another Country
    91. Bless Me, Ultima
    92. Looking for Alaska
    93. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
    94. Swan Song
    95. Mind Invaders
    96. White Teeth
    97. Ghost
    98. The Coldest Winter Ever
    99. The Intuitionist
    100. Doña Bárbára

  15. #15
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