Blooker Prize Blog

Business Week recognizes blooks

The current issue of Business Week had a big article on the phenomenon of blooks, and it includes a slide show highlighting all three Blooker winners and other high-profile blooks. To be honest, we're pretty ticked off that it mischaracterizes Lulu.com as a vanity publisher and down-plays the significance of the Blooker Prize. However, it does spot-light what we've known all along, blooks are not a flash-in-the-pan phenomenon. In addition to the Blooker winners, non-fiction short-lister All the President's Spin gets a mention, as wall as entrant Warren Meyer and his blook Coyote Blog: Year One (available at Lulu).

Other blooks mentioned in the article/slide-show:

My War: Killing Time in Iraq by Colby Buzzell
Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog from Iraq by Riverbend - nominated for the Samuel Johnson Prize!
PostSecret: Extraordinary Confessions from Ordinary Lives by Frank Warren
Straight Up & Dirty by Stephanie Klein

None of these books were entered in the 2006 Blooker Prize, but there's always next year!

Speaking of blooks that were not considered for the Blooker, I wanted to mention Katrina and the Lost City of New Orleans by Rod Amis. Contest judge Robin Miller was one of the original editors of the blook, and for that reason, we had to disqualify it for entry. We did not have an official "honorable mention" list this year, but if we had, Rod's book would have been at the top.

Thanks to all the judges

A big part of the reason the inaugural Lulu Blooker Prize has been such a success is the talented group of people on the judicial committee. They not only did they deftly handle the difficult task of selecting the winners from a pool of excellent entries, but they helped put a sheen of respectability on this little upstart literary contest of ours.

So, once again, here are this year's core judges:

Cory Doctorow - www.craphound.com and www.boingboing.net

Paul Jones - www.ibiblio.org/pjones/wordpress and www.ibiblio.org

Robin "Roblimo" Miller - www.roblimo.com and www.slashdot.org

Our thanks also goes out to all the members of our previously unsung short-list selection committee.

Richard Dansky
Ben Kimmel
Kathryn Nasser
Melinda Thielbar
Barry Wilson

Lastly, for his invaluable assistance with the Comics category, we want to extend special thanks to Andrew Neal and

 

Let us not forget the runners-up

Although they were included in our press release, very few places have reported on the runners-up. Monday's print version of the USA Today article listed them, but, sadly, they were left out of the online article.

Here's what some of the judges had to say about the runners-up:

Non-fiction: Biodiesel Power by Lyle Estill

"Biodiesel Power tells the true story of a blog-enabled community that is a real force for good in the world, using the Internet to coordinate their efforts to generate viable, plausible alternatives to petrochemicals." - Cory Doctorow

"This blook is about obsession and drive and community. It is printed and bound in the most environmentally friendly manner true to the last drop of ink to the higher goals for the writer. This attention to detail, to harmony, inform the writing and the story telling while the self-reflective humor in the stories keep the blook from becoming preachy and sour." - Paul Jones

"Biodiesel preserved its essential "blogness" and was cleverly edited into book form without hiding its online roots."
- Robin Miller

Fiction: hackoff.com by Tom Evslin

"Vividly captures the spirit of online chatter and was well suited to serialization on a blog -- the form combined with the geeky subject  matter and a cracking whodunnit make this book an excellent read for blook-fans." - Cory Doctorow

Comics: Dinosaur Comics: Huge Teeth, Beaks, Intelligence, and Ambition
             by Ryan North

"A single set of illustrations manipulated into dozens of different stories by the words alone. The art, and by that I mean the skill and imagination, dazzles me at every page turn. Everyone I hand this blook to is delighted and laughing." - Paul Jones

"Funny as hell and thrifty in its use of recycled paste-up imagery from strip to strip. There are genius comic moments in this little book of big lizards." - Cory Doctorow

boing...

I suppose it was bound to happen eventually, considering Cory Doctorow was one of this year's judges, but The Blooker has been BoingBoing'ed!

This will not doubt add to the already extensive blog coverage we've been getting, most of which has been quite enthusiastic. Of course there will always be some skeptics out there in both the press and the blogosphere, but we here at the Blooker believe that blooks are here to stay...despite the silly name.

Blooker news circles the globe!

The news of the announcement was broken first in the UK by The Independent, followed closely by The Telegraph and USA Today. Once Reuters picked it up, press all over the world began reporting on the winners of the first annual Lulu Blooker Prize!

Countries that have covered the announcement so far:

• France
• The Netherlands
• Romania
• South Africa
• India
• North Korea
• Indonesia
• Australia
• Canada

Oh, and I nearly forgot, NPR Marketplace, BBC World Service, The New York Times...

And the Winners are...

We are very excited to announce the winners of the first annual Lulu Blooker Prize!

Overall Winner (and Non-Fiction Winner): Julie & Julia by Julie Powell

Fiction Winner: Four and Twenty Blackbirds by Cherie Priest

Comics Winner: Totally Boned: A Joe and Monkey Collection by Zach Miller

Congratulations to all the winners!