Whale’s Tales
The art deco design of The Griffin on Gansevoort Street looks like something straight out of The Great Gatsby, making it a fitting location last Thursday for an awards ceremony all about booksthe first annual Moby Awards. Id call it an entire night
devoted to honoring the best and worst in book trailers, but that would be selling it shortor, rather, longas the ceremony was over in less than 45 minutes.
The Moby Awards are the brainchild of Dennis Johnson, publisher of the Dumbo-based Melville House books. Johnson created the awards as a tongueand-cheek homage to the infiltration of the film industry into the book publishing business, and while the atmosphere at The Griffin was formal, featuring writer types in bow ties sipping on champagne, the ceremony itself was not.
Winners were selected by the MobyLives Academy, whose members included book industry bigwigs like Colin Robinson of OR Books and Carolyn Kellogg, lead book blogger for the Los Angeles Times, who participated in the ceremony via Skype.
Awards were given out in categories including Best Cameo in a Book Trailer and Best Performance By An Author, as well as for the Best Indie Book Trailer (the award went to Kathryn Regina for I Am In The Air Right Now) and Best Big Budget Trailer (Maurice Gee for Going West).
Those who should be ashamed of their Internet offerings were honored too. Like Patricia Rockwell, who won an award for the Least Likely Trailer to Sell the Book for her book Sounds of Murder. Other honors were given in categories including Most Annoying
Music (New Year At the Pier by April Halprin Wayland), Bloodiest Book trailer (Killer by Dave Zeltserman) and Biggest Waste of Conglomerate Money (Level 26: Dark Origins by Anthony Zuiker).
Author Dennis Cass summed up the nights sentiments best in an excerpt from the trailer for his book Head Case, in which he says, Twenty years ago when I decided to be a writer, a big part of the dream was being able to put little videos on the Internet.
Satirical surmises like that are largely why he won the Best Performance by an Author award in the first place. Cass couldnt be there Thursday night, but phoned in his acceptance speech.
In fact, not a single winner was on hand to accept his award, a handsome golden statue in the shape of a whale. Not that this stopped anyone from presenting. Like John Wray, who happened to be handing out the Best Cameo In A Book Trailer Award, for which his book Lowboy was nominated. What happens if I win? Wray pondered at the presenters podium. Do I touch myself inappropriately? Luckily he didnt have toat least not for our sake. Wray announced the winner to be The Hangover star Zach Galifianakis, who appeared in the Lowboy trailer. Hollywoods takeover of publishing, it seemed, was complete.