In Defence of Book Bloggers

TLS editor and Man Booker Prize judge Sir Peter Stothard has said that while it's wonderful that people have an opinion on books, and there are so many websites and blogs devoted to the study of literature, but "not everyone's opinion is worth the same." John Self (Martin Amis protagonist name?) responds:

The greatest tool bloggers have at their disposal – to be exercised with caution – is space. Former fiction editor of the TLS, Lindsay Duguid, said that "in a short review, you can probably only get over three points". A blog can explore a book at a length that all but the most prominent literary critics would envy. Today, social networking sites encourage expression to be short and punchy, not balanced and thoughtful. The Man Booker prize this year removed the users' forum from its revamped site, and now limits reader responses to the books to Facebook comments and tweets. In such circumstances, the opportunity that blogs continue to offer for long-form engagement with literature should not be denigrated, but celebrated.

The critic James Wood discussed this briefly at the NYPL back in 2008. That's worth looking at.