Picking a book

So many covers, so many writers. How to choose a fine book among the thousands in the shelves? Ok, you can do a safe move and go for Homer, but… what if you are in the mood for a contemporary pick? This is the way I see it.

First things first: the title. Yeah, take a good look at the title before you choose your book. As a writer, I know it is a treacherous piece of information, but I generally agree with you, chaser of books. The title is a central piece of information and it says so many things about the object you are holding in your hands. I don’t generally trust one-word titles, but take your chances on them. I have enjoyed some of those tricky bastards, too. Ultimately, I can assure you there are bad titles in disguise or the other way around, if you know what I mean. So, mind the gap and pay no attention to this first tip.

Second. The power of covers. Nothing beats an image nowadays, but make no mistake: there’s no actual relationship between covers and words. No need to read this paragraph, then. However, check on those elegant Fitzcarraldo pieces of art. Elegant, firm, simple. God, I could grab them in the pitch dark.

Thirdly. No way. Don’t read the plot in the back cover. Either it is requested to the author by the publishing book (bad idea, it means they haven’t read the book and they will go Hey, you are the best person to do it, you are the writer after all and you know what you have created better than us, uh?) or it is the creation of a rushy clerk with his Netflix eyes fixed on the next episode of the Squid Game 2 she is watching on her tube ride home.

Last, but not least: open the novel and read the first paragraph, the first line, the first few words. Afterwards, if it’s any good, take a deep breath and jump up to the last paragraph, line, words. As I did with the last book I felt attracted to. The novel started with “Cities at night, I feel, contain men who cry in their sleep and then say Nothing. It's nothing. Just sad dreams”. Not bad. I navigated then through the pages until I reached the end: “And then there is the information, which is nothing, and comes at night”.

In my view, that’s how it’s done. And that’s how I bought The Information, by Martin Amis.