the complete review Quarterly
Volume V, Issue 1   --   February, 2004


State of the Site - page 2

Annual Report for
the complete review - 2003

page 1 | page 3



II. Popularity and Interest


        i. Reviews

       For the first time, a review of a non-fiction book was the most popular of the year -- Eric Schlosser 's Fast Food Nation, a book which was already very popular but benefited further from a surge of interest in 2003.
       While the top-ten showed practically no change from last year (except some shifting in positions), there was considerable more movement in the top-30 (now expanded to a top-50 list). There were several that were only added in 2003 that made the list, most notably (and quite surprisingly) Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis (arguably the book of the year, popularity-wise) and Dai Sijie's Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, which looks likely to have the greatest staying-power among newly added titles.

       The fifty most popular reviews at the complete review in 2003 were:

       (2002 ranking in brackets, with "-" meaning review was not in the top 250 and "n.a." meaning review was added in 2003)
  1. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser (3)
  2. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov (1)
  3. Proof, David Auburn (9)
  4. Arcadia, Tom Stoppard (5)
  5. Lolita, Richard Corliss (2)
  6. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (6)
  7. King Leopold's Ghost, Adam Hochschild (4)
  8. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton (8)
  9. 'Art', Yasmina Reza (10)
  10. Atonement, Ian McEwan (-)
  11. Marat/Sade, Peter Weiss (13)
  12. Norwegian Wood, Murakami Haruki (47)
  13. The Shawl, Cynthia Ozick (14)
  14. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (n.a.)
  15. Lolita: A Screenplay, Vladimir Nabokov (15)
  16. The Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester (11)
  17. Big Women, Fay Weldon (7)
  18. The Story of the Stone, Cao Xueqin (18)
  19. Eucalyptus, Murray Bail (17)
  20. Life x 3, Yasmina Reza (107)
  21. Am kürzeren Ende der Sonnenallee, Thomas Brussig (12)
  22. Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges (23)
  23. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson (25)
  24. Copenhagen, Michael Frayn (86)
  25. The Real Thing, Tom Stoppard (21)
  26. Middlesex, Jeffrey Eugenides (179)
  27. Faster than the Speed of Light, João Magueijo (n.a.)
  28. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen (19)
  29. The Little Friend, Donna Tartt (69)
  30. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Murakami Haruki (49)
  31. The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin (16)
  32. "A Problem from Hell", Samantha Power (121)
  33. The Discovery of Heaven, Harry Mulisch (20)
  34. The Flight of Icarus, Raymond Queneau (27)
  35. Collected Fictions, Jorge Luis Borges (26)
  36. Prey, Michael Crichton (67)
  37. Fear and Trembling, Amélie Nothomb (32)
  38. The Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson (146)
  39. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, Dai Sijie (n.a.)
  40. The Elementary Particles, Michel Houellebecq (30)
  41. Complete Works and Other Stories, Augusto Monterroso (97)
  42. Zazie in the Metro, Raymond Queneau (28)
  43. Spinning into Butter, Rebecca Gilman (29)
  44. On Love, Alain de Botton (36)
  45. House of Leaves, Mark Z. Danielewski (45)
  46. The Invention of Love, Tom Stoppard (22)
  47. The Triple Helix, Richard Lewontin (31)
  48. Blue Remembered Hills, Dennis Potter (39)
  49. Living to Tell the Tale, Gabriel García Márquez (n.a.)
  50. Reading Rilke, William H. Gass (33)
       Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation was the most popular review, fairly easily topping last years number one, Lolita. For every 100 hits the Fast Food Nation-review received the other top-15 received the following:
  1. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser - 100
  2. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov - 75
  3. Proof, David Auburn - 50
  4. Arcadia, Tom Stoppard - 39
  5. Lolita, Richard Corliss - 38
  6. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving - 37
  7. King Leopold's Ghost, Adam Hochschild - 34
  8. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton - 31
  9. 'Art', Yasmina Reza - 24
  10. Atonement, Ian McEwan - 24
  11. Marat/Sade, Peter Weiss - 22
  12. Norwegian Wood, Murakami Haruki - 21
  13. The Shawl, Cynthia Ozick - 21
  14. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi - 20
  15. Lolita: A Screenplay, Vladimir Nabokov - 19
       (The 50th ranked review got about 11 page-views for every 100 Fast Food Nation got, the 100th about 6.)

       Established reviews continued to do very well, but a surprising number of new reviews performed exceptionally well. The best placing of reviews added in 2003 were:
       The popularity of new additions was as unpredictable as always, but we're fairly pleased with the mix of titles that did attract attention. It's unclear which will have staying power, other than Dai Sijie's Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress. Particularly noteworthy: no new dramas performed exceptionally well (in part due to the absence of any new reviews of any big first-run plays).
       Murakami Haruki was probably the author with the biggest gains (as our author page on him also was by far the most popular of these). Amélie Nothomb -- despite hanging on with the second most popular author page -- was among the losers: interest in coverage of her books remains great, but nowhere as dominant as it has been at previous years. However, late-2003 additions of reviews of her two most recent works (and the forthcoming publication of her Dictionary of Proper Names in the UK) will probably help improve her position again.

       Outside links to individual reviews brought significant short-term traffic to two titles: Eric Alterman's mention of our review of his What Liberal Media ? at his Altercation-weblog generated several hundred referrals a day for several days (with a single-day high of over 500 referrals), while Neil Gaiman's link to our review of Francis Spufford The Child that Books Built at his weblog generated more than 500 referrals a day for several days. The Alterman title already enjoyed considerable popularity (though that tailed off significantly as the year progressed; it finished as only the 134th most popular review), but the Gaiman mention was certainly responsible for pushing the Spufford title into the top 100.

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        ii. Links to Amazon

       Our links to the Amazon.com pages for the books under review (and, where available, the British Amazon.co.uk, Canadian Amazon.ca, German Amazon.de, and French Amazon.fr pages) continue to be popular. Click throughs are up in line with the increase in traffic. Purchases increased at an even greater rate at Amazon.com, continued at the same rate at Amazon.co.uk, and continued to be relatively negligible at Amazon.de and Amazon.fr. The addition of links to Amazon.ca (Canada) in 2003 has led to no appreciable click throughs or purchases (in part certainly also because of the relatively limited number of links that we've added so far).
       A noteworthy trend is the increased shift to sales of so-called "marketplace" items -- i.e. used book sales through Amazon.com. While still minimal at Amzon.co.uk and Amazon.de, such sales now account for a third of all of ours at Amazon.com (up from about quarter last year)

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               1. Amazon.com - US

       The American Amazon site, Amazon.com, continues to receive a great deal of traffic from the complete review, as users appear to find links to it -- and the ability to purchase titles under review -- useful.

       The most purchased titles among reviewed book were:
  1. Proof, David Auburn
  2. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
  3. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton
  4. Spinning into Butter, Rebecca Gilman
  5. 'Art', Yasmina Reza
  6. "A Problem from Hell", Samantha Power
  7. The Singing Detective, Dennis Potter
  8. The Golden Days, the first volume of The Story of the Stone, Cao Xueqin
  9. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
  10. The Discovery of Heaven, Harry Mulisch
  11. King Leopold's Ghost, Adam Hochschild
  12. The Life and Adventures of Trobadora Beatrice as Chronicled by her Minstrel Laura, Irmtraud Morgner
  13. The Child that Books Built, Francis Spufford
  14. The Girl who Played Go, Shan Sa
  15. Life x 3, Yasmina Reza
       It's an interesting mix: playscripts did predictably well (Proof was the most-produced play in the US in 2003, so it's no surprise that many copies of it were purchased), while Persepolis was a true sales-surprise (both generally and at the site itself). Certainly, we're glad to see we've helped to convince a number of people to have a look at more imposing fare (The Anatomy of Melancholy, the Morgner).
       Noteworthy among these bestsellers: all the copies of The Singing Detective were of the marketplace (i.e. used) variety (meaning high sales volume did not translate into impressive commissions). Also noteworthy: several dictionaries (not under review) -- Arabic/English, Persian/English, and Pashto-English -- sold ten or more copies each.
       Only a single copy of Fast Food Nation was sold via a link from our site last year, but this year it has done much better (it was also a more popular review, but not by anywhere near the same margin).

       The reviews that users clicked-through to Amazon.com most frequently were:
       (For purposes of this list all click-throughs for separate editions of the same title have been lumped together.)
  1. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
  2. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
  3. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton
  4. Proof, David Auburn
  5. King Leopold's Ghost, Adam Hochschild
  6. 'Art', Yasmina Reza
  7. The Golden Days - the first volume of The Story of the Stone
  8. The Shawl, Cynthia Ozick
  9. Lolita, Richard Corliss
  10. On Love, Alain de Botton
  11. Faster than the Speed of Light, João Magueijo
  12. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
  13. Life x 3, Yasmina Reza
  14. The Flight of Icarus, Raymond Queneau
  15. Eucalyptus, Murray Bail
       The list is much closer to the list of most popular reviews than most purchased ones; the decision whether or not to buy a specific book thus seems more often to be made only at the Amazon.com page itself, and not merely after reading that information we provide.

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               2. Amazon.co.uk - UK

       There were again hundreds of titles purchased through Amazon.co.uk, but again they were a very wide selection, with barely any titles reaching double-digit sales. The Anatomy of Melancholy and (somewhat surprisingly again, even though it was the most popular review of the year) Fast Food Nation were the titles selling the most copies.

       The reviews that users clicked-through to Amazon.co.uk most frequently were:
       (For purposes of this list all click-throughs for separate editions of the same title have been lumped together.)
  1. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
  2. Blue Remembered Hills, Dennis Potter
  3. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
  4. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton
  5. The Great Fire of London, Jacques Roubaud
  6. 'Art', Yasmina Reza
  7. Lolita, Richard Corliss
  8. Big Women, Fay Weldon
  9. Norwegian Wood, Murakami Haruki
  10. Marat/Sade, Peter Weiss
  11. Essays in Love, Alain de Botton
  12. What a Carve Up ! ,Jonathan Coe
  13. Georges Perec, David Bellos
  14. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
  15. Death and the Dervish, Mesa Selimovic
       The list is, again, similar to the previous year's, with the usual British quirks -- Blue Remembered Hills, The Great Fire of London. Something of a surprise was the popularity of Persepolis, which reportedly sold much worse in the UK than the US.

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               3. Amazon.ca - Canada

       Starting in March 2003 links to Amazon.ca (Canada) were also added to the complete review. These have proved of almost no interest whatsoever to our users, showing by far the worst results of an Amazon.com affiliation at the complete review. In part this is certainly due to the fact that only a limited number of links are available (they have been added gradually), but even taking that into account they have faired very poorly.

       The reviews that users clicked-through to Amazon.ca most frequently were:
       (For purposes of this list all click-throughs for separate editions of the same title have been lumped together.)
  1. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
  2. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
  3. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
  4. The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton
  5. Proof, David Auburn
  6. Essays inn Love, Alain de Botton
  7. Norwegian Wood, Murakami Haruki
  8. Faster than the Speed of Light, João Magueijo
  9. "A Problem from Hell", Samantha Power
  10. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving
  11. King Leopold's Ghost, Adam Hochschild
  12. Sonnets of Love and Death, Jean de Sponde
  13. The Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester
  14. 'Art', Yasmina Reza
  15. Eucalyptus, Murray Bail

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               4. Amazon.fr - France

       Purchases via links to Amazon.fr were again relatively limited in 2003.

       The reviews that users clicked-through to Amazon.fr most frequently were:
       (For purposes of this list all click-throughs for separate editions of the same title have been lumped together.)
  1. Stupeur et Tremblements, Amélie Nothomb
  2. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
  3. Zazie dans le métro, Raymond Queneau
  4. Art, Yasmina Reza
  5. Mercure, Amélie Nothomb
  6. La Place, Annie Ernaux
  7. Le Sabotage amoureux, Amélie Nothomb
  8. Métaphysique des tubes, Amélie Nothomb
  9. Robert des noms propres, Amélie Nothomb
  10. Les empereurs du Fast-Food, Eric Schlosser
  11. Les armoires vides, Annie Ernaux
  12. La Procédure, Harry Mulisch
  13. Persépolis (vol. 3), Marjane Satrapi
  14. Cosmétique de l'ennemi, Amélie Nothomb
  15. Un barbare en Asie, Henri Michaux
       At least here Amélie Nothomb continued to assert herself -- and Eric Schlosser's book proved to be of great interest even in translation.

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               5. Amazon.de - Germany

       There were some 25 per cent fewer click-throughs to Amazon.de than Amazon.fr -- but almost 50 per cent more sales. We have no idea why.

       The reviews that users clicked-through to Amazon.de most frequently were:
       (For purposes of this list all click-throughs for separate editions of the same title have been lumped together.)
  1. Am kürzeren Ende der Sonnenallee, Thomas Brussig
  2. Geschichten vom Herrn Keuner, Bertolt Brecht
  3. Die Unvollendete Geschichte und ihr Ende, Volker Braun
  4. Kunst, Yasmina Reza
  5. Das Attentat, Harry Mulisch
  6. Fast Food Gesellschaft, Eric Schlosser
  7. Anatomie der Melancholie, Robert Burton
  8. Die Entdeckung des Himmels, Harry Mulisch
  9. Rituals, Cees Nooteboom
  10. Mit Staunen und Zittern, Amélie Nothomb
  11. Zazie in der Metro, Raymond Queneau
  12. Naokos Lächeln, Murakami Haruki
  13. Schneller als die Lichtgeschwindigkeit, João Magueijo
  14. Die Ermittlung, Peter Weiss
  15. Helden wie wir, Thomas Brussig
       Surprises included Schlosser's conquering of even this market, and the popularity of the Magueijo title.

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        iii. Indices

       The most popular indices at the complete review of books under review -- suggesting what users were looking for (and not necessarily what the site could provide) -- were:
       (Note that this list only includes genre/nationality/language indices -- and not those listing the most popular, underrated, worst books etc. -- or indices for author pages and other non-review pages.)
  1. Biography and Memoirs
  2. Latin and South American Literature
  3. Contemporary British Fiction
  4. Literary Essays
  5. Poetry
  6. Drama
  7. French Literature
  8. Contemporary American Fiction
  9. Eastern European Literature
  10. German Literature
       Biographical works continued to be by far the most sought titles. There was also an impressive jump in interest in Latin and South American Literature, an index that was only the tenth most popular in 2002.

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        iv. Author Pages

       The complete review's Author Pages remain popular, especially the top two.
       The top ten (of forty-four) in 2003 were:
  1. Murakami Haruki
  2. Amélie Nothomb
  3. Harry Mulisch
  4. Cynthia Ozick
  5. Patrick White
  6. Antonio Tabucchi
  7. Zbigniew Herbert
  8. Annie Ernaux
  9. Geoff Dyer
  10. Tom Stoppard
       Murakami Haruki easily took the top spot -- and by a huge margin (65 per cent more page-views than Nothomb, 160 per cent more than Mulisch)
       None of the author-pages added in 2003 attracted a great amount of attention, but the most popular among them was that for A.S.Byatt.

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        v. Articles from the complete review Quarterly

       Older articles continued to be the most popular at the cr Quarterly, but new and updated material also did well.

       The most popular articles in 2003 were:
  1. Literary Weblogs - An Overview
  2. Whoa Nelly ! - Real Life, Lucky Girls, and Advances in Non-Fiction -- a Literary Saloon dialogue
  3. Borges under Review - Critical Responses to the Collected Fictions
  4. A Book, an Author, and a Talk Show Host - Some Notes on the Oprah-Franzen Debacle
  5. Withering Reviews - an editorial wondering Where have all the book reviews gone ?
  6. Year-End Panel - 2003
  7. Socialist Magical Realism - a review of Irmtraud Morgner's East German classic, Trobadora Beatrice
  8. Looking for Ayi Kwei Armah
  9. Considering B.R.Myers' Reader's Manifesto
  10. Measuring Success - Some thoughts about bestseller lists and box office numbers
       We updated the article on Literary Weblogs in November, 2003, and that brought a huge surge of interest (helped by many outside links to the piece). The publication of Nell Freudenberger's book, Lucky Girls, led to additional interest in the always-popular Whoa Nelly !. The big surprise was the success of the Alex Good-organised Year-End Panel: it was only added in the last days of the year (and was also available at goodreports.net) but still got an impressive amount of page-views.
       But these annual surveys of the site (like this one) remain of practically no interest to anyone, last year's interesting barely 500 readers.

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        vi. Other Information-pages at the Complete Review

       The complete review also offers a number of pages that provide additional information about the site, including listing the best, worst, most unusual, most popular, etc. reviews. Many of these pages received a large volume of page views. In 2003 the most popular were:
  1. The top rated books under review
  2. Editors' Choice
  3. The most underrated books under review
  4. Recent publications under review
  5. Recent bestseller list
  6. Current bestseller list
  7. The lowest rated books under review
  8. List of literary links
  9. Notable new releases under review
  10. Most obscure books under review

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