The Trouble With Hot Toddy

It's been a great month for The Speculative Scotsman. There's been at least one article published every day since the blog launched on January 1st, running the gamut from commentary to reviews and from news round-ups to more original content, the likes of which proved such a resounding success yesterday. There's already a great deal on TSS that I'm proud of, not to mention several write-ups that have resonated in one way or another with readers old and new.

Hot Toddy, I'm afraid, has not yet fallen into either category. Bestsellers, it seems, are a curious business. To say they're deathly predictable here in the UK is a dramatic understatement; if it's not Stephanie Meyer or Charlaine Harris, the book-buying masses don't seem to give a damn. Neither does Amazon's variety of hourly-updated charts seem an appropriate nor an accurate measure of what's hot and what's not in fiction, film and video-games.

You might not think it, but cobbling together some snark each week to fill out the star-studded Top 25s can be a beast of an amount of work, and when it's done, I don't feel as if I've added anything new to the great conversation. Above all else, that's what I want The Speculative Scotsman to represent, and though I don't admit defeat easily, after starting on this week's Hot Toddy only to see how similar the latest charts were to last week's, which were in their turn near-enough identical to the week before's, I think it might be for the best to nip this one in the bud

So. There won't be a new Hot Toddy this week, and perhaps not next week, either. I'm going to take some time to think about how to present the charts properly, retool the foundations of this recurring write-up some and bring it back, when it's done, in a better form.

But fear not, Monday morning readers. You'll hardly notice it's gone. In place of this week's edition, in fact, I'm bringing forward a book review that's been waiting patiently in the wings since I read The Angel's Game over the New Year. Keep 'em peeled, and do, above all, enjoy. That's what TSS is here for, at the end of the day.

Yes, I mean you.

Hot Toddy 2010: Week Ending 11/01/10

That's right, readers: your eyes do not deceive you. Hot Toddy is back for an unprecedented second edition... bigger, better and more bad-ass than the first.

Except for --- well. To be perfectly honest, Britain's buying public haven't been any more discerning with their recession-era pennies this week than they were before. To see speculative fiction dominating the various up-to-the-hour Top 25s provided by Amazon is a fine thing, truly, and yet I can't help but bemoan that the vast majority of what's popular amongst the genres we hold so hear is derivative at best and downright rubbish at the other end of the spectrum.

What a bittersweet redemption this is.

 

In Fiction

(1) To absolutely no-one's surprise, Breaking Dawn, the last of the foul Twilight franchise, holds on to the top spot in fiction for another week. At this point, Stephanie Meyer is like that spoiled rich kid who kicks over the sandcastle you've spent your day at the beach constructing.

(4) Placing twice in the Top 25 this week, this movie tie-in edition of Cormac McCarthy's exquisite post-apocalyptic nightmare The Road just misses out on a medal.

(5) No doubt aided in its conquest of Amazon's list of bestselling books by Stephen King's declaration that it's his favourite book of last year, The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters has climbed high this week. The Speculative Scotsman for one bought his recommendation hook, line and sinker.

(7) Now you're just spoiling everyone's fun, Stephanie Meyer! Nearing its ninth month on the charts, The Host holds onto the 7th spot like a nasty case of lice.

Hot Toddy 2010: Week Ending 04/01/10

Although it pains me to begin the first proper edition of Hot Toddy with such an ignoble effort, I can't simply declare that things I despise don't meet the criteria for speculative fiction, so...


In Fiction

(1) Leading the charge at the top of the 25 bestselling books this week is Breaking Dawn, the fourth and thankfully final installment of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight Saga. To my chagrin and indeed much of the internet's, if the Harry Potter franchise was any indication we can expect to see this author featured in Hot Toddy for a long time to come.

(5) Though Charlaine Harris is a better writer by half than the near-illiterate drivel of the Twilight novels, I don't and won't count myself among her many admirers. The latest Sookie Stackhouse book, Dead and Gone, places at #5.

(6) Stephanie Meyer's 2008 novel, The Host, has experienced something of a resurgence in recent weeks; presumably as a gift for Twilight fans who've already devoured the entire series. I'm sure they'll find a lot to like in this execrable alien love triangle, the 6th bestselling book in the UK this week. The rest of us must simply resist the temptation to tear out our unbelieving eyes.

(7) A boxed set of Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse series repackaged as an introduction to True Blood takes the #7 spot.

Hot Toddy 2010: Zero Hour

From four full days of accumulated wisdom I have cleverly determined that the week, not coincidentally, ends on a Sunday. Right around midnight of that night, in fact.

Thus: at the hour of howling every seven days through 2010, I mean to take a close look at the various Bestseller lists Amazon makes available. Every Monday, The Speculative Scotsman will publish a new installment of Hot Toddy, which promises to recount with a modicum of commentary those entries, new and age-old alike, in the Top 25 Books, DVDs and Video Games that might in some way appeal to readers, viewers and players of speculative fiction - to readers, in other words, of this little blog that could.

No doubt you've seen something like this before. Surely we all look at Pat's Fantasy Hotlist on a regular basis for his rundown of the best-selling fiction according to the New York Times - not to mention the rest of the content he so kindly provides. Where Hot Toddy will make itself distinct from Patrick's excellent catch-up session is in its concern with a wider range of media than simply fiction and its necessarily British interests. Would that there were a bestseller list available for Scotland alone; alas, Amazon's hourly Top 25s will have to do for the moment.

We'll get the ball rolling properly later today.