For the second month in a row, Sergio De La Pava is king of our Top Ten.
“De La Pava’s indifference to the prevailing trends of the marketplace helps to account for the number of rejections he would receive from literary agents (88, according to The Chicago Tribune.) But it’s also what’s so alarming about his novel’s close brush with obscurity. It suggests that traditional publishing has become woefully backward-looking, trying to shape the novel of tomorrow based on what happened yesterday. Could A Naked Singularity have benefited from a good editor? Of course, but books like this — singular, urgent, commanding — are supposed to be what good editors live for.”
- Outside the Ring: A Profile of Sergio De La Pava by Garth Risk Hallberg
A self-published magnum opus was, to say the least, an unusual project for a prestigious university press. It had to pass muster with the board of faculty members and administrators that signs off on each book published. But, thanks in large measure to statements of support from the novelist Brian Evenson and critics including Steven Moore, the press decided to acquire the rights to the book. From there, it was only a hop, skip, and a jump to the window of my local Barnes & Noble, where I passed it just this week.
Garth Risk Hallberg on the self-publishing success story behind Sergio De La Pava’s A Naked Singularity
