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The New York Times Book Review may not have asked for an ombudsman — but it has one in Jennifer Weiner, who has routinely criticized the Book Review for its lack of female contributors. The combative, polarizing Weiner has a history of literary feuds, many of them waged against what she perceives, rightly or not, as the pretentious, male-dominated bastion of literary fiction. She has both her detractors and supporters; certainly, she has the publishing world's attention.
Weiner's latest target is Bookends, a new feature of the Book Review announced yesterday by Pamela Paul. Almost as soon as the feature — which will allow two authors to discuss a potentially contentious literary topic — went live, Weiner weighed in with her criticism:
New NYTBR columnists. Ladies: lots. Commercial writers: zero. MT @PamelaPaulNYT: Introducing Back Page columnists:http://t.co/Tr0yKV3287
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 3, 2013
Wishing NYTBR would just say "we exist solely for 5000 readers of literary fiction." Except I think they just did. http://t.co/ydt4E2czko
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 3, 2013
Apparently, Weiner was not mollified by the inaugural Bookends discussion, between Adam Kirsch and Zoë Heller, on whether novelists are too timid in criticizing each other (a problem that, it must be said, Weiner does not suffer from):
1/2 Early "Bookends" observations: it's not a very lively conversation, when both parties make the same points, share the same assumptions.
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 4, 2013
2/2 Heller and Kirsch say novelists fear making enemies bc they work in the academy, all know each other. Maybe literary writers do...
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 4, 2013
That criticism of Bookends continued apace this afternoon:
Bookends #1 displays the qualities its writers abhor -- it's toothless, tepid, engineered not to offend or provoke. So what's the point?
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 4, 2013
Final hope: that @AnnaHolmes and @thehighsign do better than the debut column. Book reviews can't afford to be boring or irrelevant.
— Jennifer Weiner (@jenniferweiner) September 4, 2013
(Anna Holmes was recently a guest editor of The Atlantic Wire.)