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June 24, 2004
He Won't Like It, He Hates Everything! (Not!)
by Ron HoganBookExpo is long gone, but the Book Babes are still getting columns out of it. Today they offer highlights of their conversation with Dale Peck, in a mellow mood, as he talks about what he does like:
I have a great admiration for commercial writers like Stephen King and Danielle Steele. One of the reason why their books do so well is because they believe in what they're doing. They do not dress it up. Especially Stephen King. There is something vital about the way people respond to his work. And he should be proud of that. I've read 20 Stephen King novels and have never seen one that it seemed that he phoned in. When I was a little kid, I was a big fan of Danielle Steele. I would always steal my sister's book.
But their headline's a bit misleading, as Peck doesn't so much "bury the hatchet" as make one more effort to explain what he was doing in all those negative reviews, only this time without Carlin Romano firing back at him.
Peck is getting way too much press and it seems obvious to me by quotes like this that he is shooting from the hip and wants little more than to be a provocateur. He has talent - I've read some of his work, but so do lotsa folks.
Actually, in all fairness, I think he's mostly right about Stephen King. I'm not brave enough to test his thesis on Danielle Steele, though.
Posted by: editor at June 25, 2004 06:51 PMyour PayPal donation
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