I'm sure some of the members of the film tourneys will be wondering why in the blue hell I'm asking about a book tourney. Yes, I'm treading in different waters.

So, has the board had one before? An ultimate book tourney? Six books each team, who can compile the best literature? All "fiction".

Who here has got the brass ones to go through with it?

could be interesting.

alright good, good feedback so far

I'm in but I don't think I can run it.

I was in until this.

I'd play.

I'd probably play

I'd play but how do we judge on something as subjective as this? I won't touch it if someone like IHRM is judging. I've read enough of his dogmatic, overbearing, so and so is better argumentive stance on the arts to know that it won't fly in something like this.

It'd work like all other RM tourneys, right? A+E readers vote on winners?

I, for one, think we should allow fiction and nonfiction, plus poetry and (maybe) drama. It'd give a much bigger pool for things to choose from.

However, we'd have to lay out some ground rules in advance, so people couldn't pick "The Collected Plays of Shakespeare" or "The Complete Poetry of Charles Bukowski."

The Stand by Stephen King is the best book ever written. Tourney a mute point.

I wanna play, even if we do exclude non-fiction ( ).

yeah, i dont see where this would differ from the movie tourney except in medium

i'm in. i would prefer all fiction but don't care if others are included.

let the mccarthy-bolano-DFW jerkfest commence.

this

lol

I think that's going to be the challenge for everyone who participates, since many voters may have lines like, "You just picked that because everyone on here reads it!" etc

You know what would be cool? If in the tourney you had to pick works from different major genre (with some wildcards). So our teams would look something like:

Novel:
Short Story:
Poem:
Play:
Essay:
Non-Fiction:
Wildcard #1:
Wildcard #2:

We'd get a much wider selection of works this way. You wouldn't have to pick the categories in order. You could also place works that aren't really covered in the other categories under "Wildcard." Any other supporters?

that sounds pretty good but i'd worry about getting to the point where people haven't read more than half of your list. i would love to do a short story tournament BTW.

like someone said, part of this is going to be the strategy of picking books for votes and also voting on books you haven't read but have an impression of. like, i haven't read moby dick but what a great pick!