TOB 2015 Contest Update: Rooster Crowing!

It’s the dawn of a new day, the crowning of a new champ.

Susan came into the final week with a nice, but not insurmountable, three point lead.  On Monday, All the Light We Cannot Sees victory over An Untamed Statereshuffled the deck slightly.  Susan maintained her lead, but Jeremy, Felicity, and I climbed three spots each.

Standings after the Semifinals:

1.  Susan – 23 points

2.  Felicity – 19 points

3.  Jeremy and Me – 18

4.-6.  Chris, Melanie, and Timothy – 16 points

With the ultimate victory of Station Eleven over All the Light We Cannot See, Susan’s hopes went from bright to dark.  Like something from the apocalypse.  Chris had prepared well and passed her, 24 points to 23.  Alas, Chris forgot to pack a solar panel and ran just short of the energy needed to win.  Jeremy, apparently holed up in a Walmart next to an REI, outlasted everyone and snagged everlasting glory and a couple new books. Congraulations, Jeremy!

Final Standings:

1.  Jeremy – 26 points

2.  Chris – 24 points

3.  Susan – 23 points

4.  Felicity – 19 points

     Me – 18 points  (I don’t count)

5.  Melanie and Timothy – 16 points

Thanks to everyone who took a shot.  This seems to have been a tough year, comparing the top scores this year to years past.  But I hope you had fun over at the ToB.  Happy Reading everyone!

And just because you didn’t win, say, A Girlf is a Half-formed Thing, doesn’t mean you can’t read it anyway.  It is, hands down, the best 2014 book I read all year.  Ferrante’s trilogy, as great as that is, notwithstanding.  Don’t trust me, rely on the brilliant critic John Self or the Bailey’s Womens Prize committee.  Eimear McBride couldn’t get a publisher for 10 years.  Show Gallery Beggar Press some love for having the courage and aesthetic sense to publish this masterwork.  Or find something new and amazing at McBride’s American publisher, Coffee House Press.  And I am not plugging the book or these presses because I am getting anything for it.  I believe in supporting great writers (Eimear McBride) and the small presses who publish literary work that isn’t commercial enough or something for the big publishers.

If you’re still here, get your nose in a book!

[Formatting errors, lots of them, corrected. I think.]