MobyLives announces finalists for the Moby Awards for Best and Worst Book Trailers

Finalists for the first annual Moby Awards for the Best and Worst Book Trailers have been announced, a day later than promised. “Let’s just say there are a lot of writers out there with too much time on their hands,” explained MobyLives proprietor Dennis Loy Johnson. “We had to watch a lot more videos than we expected.” In all, says Megan Halpern, publicist for the awards, nearly 400 videos were submitted to the MobyLives Academy of Know It Alls, whose members will vote on the winners. (Academy members include Johnson, Halpern, Melville House co-publisher Valerie Merains, Jacket Copy‘s Carolyn Kellogg, GalleyCat‘s Jason Boog, Slate‘s Troy Patterson, and OR Books publisher Colin Robinson. )

The ceremony announcing the winners in the five announced categories — and several other surprise categories — will be held this Thursday in New York at the glitzy Griffin club in the city’s Meatpacking District. It’s an invitation-only, formal affair — seriously, you won’t get in in jeans — and features an expensive cash bar (it’s expensive because we’ve had the alcohol actually flown in from Hollywood). For more info, visit the official website. (You can RSVP here.) Meanwhile, good luck to all the finalists, especially those in the “worst of” category (given a polite euphemism in the complete list, below).

(in alphabetical order by title)

Best Low Budget/Indie Book Trailer:

A Common Pornography by Kevin Sampsell
The Electric Church in One Minute by Jeff Somers
Extraordinary Renditions by Andrew Ervin
I am in the Air Right Now by Kathryn Regina
I Lego New York by Chistoph Niemann

Best Big Budget/Big House Book Trailer:
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith
Blameless by Gail Carriger
Going West by Maurice Gee
High Before Homeroom by Maya Sloan
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Dawn of the Dreadfuls by Steve Hockensmith

Best Performance by an Author:
Gordon Lish in Collected Fictions
Dennis Cass in Head Case
Thomas Pynchon (voice of) in Inherent Vice
Daniel Handler in Kindle vs. iPad #10
Jeffrey Rotter in The Known Unknowns

Best Cameo in a Book Trailer:
Jon Stewart in I Am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil…
Jonathan Safran Foer’s Grandmother in Eating Animals
He is Legend’s Schyler Croom in High Before Homeroom
Deepak Chopra in The Karma Club
Zach Galifinakis in Lowboy

Least Likely Trailer to Sell the Book:
Pocket Guide to Mischief by Bart King
Shark Hunting in Paradise Garden by Cameron Pierce
Shoplifting from American Apparel by Tao Lin
Sounds of Murder by Patricia Rockwell
True Confections by Katharine Weber

Dennis Johnson is the founder of MobyLives, and the co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House.

2 Comments

Melissa at 3:32 pm on May 21, 2010

I’ve seen a number of these book trailers, including 3 of the Big Budget ones. From the ones I’ve seen, I’d say that although the grandmother in Jonathan Safran Foer’s Eating Animals is rather funny, on the whole, this has got to be one of the worst trailers I’d ever seen. Quite annoying, despite the fact that I’d actually be interested in reading that book otherwise.

Sounds of Murder would definitely be a hard sell if you only had this trailer to show for it. Wish I’d seen the others to compare them to it.

Finally, though the Huffington Post picks Going West by Maurice Gee as the best big budget trailer, I tend to disagree. I’ve seen better stop-motion ones (maybe not so ‘perfect’), but to be really good stop-motion animation should have some faults. Rather, I tend to think that Gail Carriger’s trailer for Blameless is far superior. It’s unique – doesn’t just tell the story of the book. Moreover, it gives viewers an inside look into how the book cover was created. With reality shows still going strong, I’d think that a behind the scenes look that is done in a cool way, would be much more effective than that of Maurice Gee’s book trailer.
Melissa at 3:32 pm on May 21, 2010

I’ve seen a number of these book trailers, including 3 of the Big Budget ones. From the ones I’ve seen, I’d say that although the grandmother in Jonathan Safran Foerâ€™s Eating Animals is rather funny, on the whole, this has got to be one of the worst trailers I’d ever seen. Quite annoying, despite the fact that I’d actually be interested in reading that book otherwise.

Sounds of Murder would definitely be a hard sell if you only had this trailer to show for it. Wish I’d seen the others to compare them to it.

Finally, though the Huffington Post picks Going West by Maurice Gee as the best big budget trailer, I tend to disagree. I’ve seen better stop-motion ones (maybe not so ‘perfect’), but to be really good stop-motion animation should have some faults. Rather, I tend to think that Gail Carriger’s trailer for Blameless is far superior. It’s unique – doesn’t just tell the story of the book. Moreover, it gives viewers an inside look into how the book cover was created. With reality shows still going strong, I’d think that a behind the scenes look that is done in a cool way, would be much more effective than that of Maurice Gee’s book trailer.