Spending a weekend with the Times' thoughts on the biggest recent releases is a ritual of mine, but I've noticed a shift lately. Their reviews of 'Fourth Wing' and 'Iron Flame' were so focused on dissecting the 'romantasy' phenomenon as a market force that they barely touched on why the characters actually connect with readers. It felt more like a report on publishing trends than a real engagement with the text. Which is fine, I guess, but it leaves me wanting.
Their take on 'Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow' aligned more with my own feelings—they got the heart of the friendship and the creative collaboration, calling it 'achingly human.' That phrase stuck with me. For works aiming at literary status, like Barbara Kingsolver's 'Demon Copperhead,' the praise is usually effusive and detailed, dissecting the prose and social commentary. It’s for the blockbuster genre stuff where the tone can get a bit anthropological, like they’re observing reader habits from a polite distance. Still, I check them every Sunday, hoping for that spark of recognition when a review nails why a book lingered in my mind for days.