Publishers Weekly Reviewers Unmasked

The Observer’s Leon Neyfakh embarks upon a new project in light of Publishers Weekly‘s dual, and related decisions to slash the freelancer rate to $25 per review and list reviewers’ names in each issue, thus ending a tradition of anonymity well over a century old and, in Neyfakh’s words, “the mystique of that booming PW voice, once so objective and

authoritative, fractured and finally shattered by the 80-something

names printed there in red ink, each referring to an individual, a

person somewhere who read a book and wrote a review of it.”

So who are these reviewers? Neyfakh has assembled a partial list (though I’d love to see complete bios on everyone who contributes, so help the guy out, would you?) that includes veteran mystery critic Dick Adler, Naomi Woronov, author of Modern American English: Living and Learning in the West,, EC Fanzine original publisher Bhob Stewart, GalleyCat’s Ron Hogan, and someone who didn’t get along with her roommate at Brown (though the lady in question, Ellen Wernecke, also was the editor-in-chief of the college newspaper, which is a much better qualification for being a PW contributor…)