As we suspected, no change in format. I suppose we’ll see the results of our feedback next week – maybe?
In the meantime, let’s play again. Don’t forget to leave a comment saying why you’ve voted as you did.
There’s a tussle for the gold star this week. Dave Spikey’s hasty textual analysis (indeed, what is wet fire?) or Jo Brand’s aversion to the subject matter? Jo gets it – her views completely in line with mine.
No problems with the black mark. Gok Wan needs to extend his vocabulary. Not everything is gorgeous.
There’s no way I’ll be looking out for Blacklands but I do like the sound of 59 Seconds.
EDIT: Was my friend Angela namechecked during the audience reviews of “The Little Stranger”?
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Effi Briest - Theodor Fontane (Readalong 
The Beauty Room - Regi Claire
My Mother's Lover - Urs Widmer
The Help - Kathryn Stockett
The Rule of Four - Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason
Noir - Robert Coover
The Taint of Midas - Anne Zouroudi
Housekeeping - Marilynne Robinson
The Duel - Anton Chekhov
The Duel - Heinrich von Kleist
Gillespie and I - Jane Harris
State of Wonder - Ann Patchett
Titus Groan - Mervyn Peake
CIty of Dreadful Night - Peter Guttridge
Shadow Sister - Simone van der Vlugt
A Far Cry From Kensington - Muriel Spark
The Assault - Harry Mulisch
Next World Novella - Matthias Politycki
The Water Theatre - Lindsay Clark
Water For Elephants - Sara Gruen
The Liberation of Celia Kahn - J David Simons
Nocturnes - Kazuo Ishiguro
Hotel Du Lac - Anita Brookner
It was better, but is that because I love Alan Davies? Well, that helped, but I think they may have done some quick editing after last week’s viewer feedback. They introduced the rest of the books at the begining (should have been done last week, of course). More time was spent on the feature book, and everyone was allowed to speak.
Yes, it was better, BUT, the book should be the star. I feel this panel is trying too hard to be the star (individually, not as a panel).
Forgot to say, as for stars, Alan Davies gets gold, Gok Wan gets black.
A slightly better show, at the start when they mentioned Blacklands so instantaneously I thought wow they have changed it already… erm no. Black mark to Gok for making the show his show. Gold star for Laila as she sort of got the point of the book more and said its not comfortable but its good. Blacklands sadly I dont think got the reviews it should of, but I will be writing about that book tomorrow. I do love this game Lizzy.
Forgot to say… the pencil bit! I know what I wanted to do with those pencils!
The pencil stuff was really lame. It is not really feasible to laugh and keep the pencil in the mouth the way the first group were told to hold it. Did anyone think of that? No, they think it proves that smiling makes you happy.
Okay, I just did an experiment. I put on a smile for 10 seconds and now I am going to tell you whether I think more highly of that segment. No, I don’t.
Another point: I don’t know why they are promoting celebrity autobiography on this show. As much as I like Alan Davies, I will never read his book. I don’t know of any book club which has read a celebrity autobiography.
I didn’t see it, unfortunately (?). That said, Lizzy, when I read your comment about Gok, I snorted with laughter. Right, off to 4OD I go…
The gold star easily goes to Alan Davies this week. He provided more useful comment than the rest of them put together!
I’m afraid Gok gets the black mark this week. His comments are beginning to wind me up
Gold Star to Alan Davies that was easy, not much competition for that one. A draw for second place for Nathaniel and Lalia I think they might do even better if Gok and Jo were banished from the sofas!
Black Mark also easy, straight to the bottom of the class for Gok I’m afraid with Ms Brand not trailing that far behind.
Gold star to Alan Davies – not sure why though.
Black star to Gok who is just totally out of his depth. But I would also give black stars to Spikey for interrupting the whole time and Jo Brand who was a wet blanket, and had hideous spectacles (liked her new hair though!)
Sorry – that’s all very shallow, but so was the show.
The fast-forward slider seems to have gone, I just couldn’t hang around through the celeb stuff …I’m losing interest fast, then the whole thing jams on the Boyd interview and goes back to the beginning for some reason and I can’t bear to sit through that advert yet again so that’s me done for this week I’m afraid.
The Brand specs are annoying, soooo distracting.
I’d love to know how they know that the first episode had however many ‘upmarket viewers’ …how do they know that? Can anyone explain?
That’s was my experience with 4OD last week, too. Terrible and 4OD used to be so good too!
No idea about the demographic analysis, however.