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Old article. I think it's been kicked around in here before.
And... what rock has journalist Johnathan Mahler been living under to write THIS line?
"Patterson may lack the name recognition of a Stephen King, a John Grisham or a Dan Brown, but he outsells them all."
Patterson's been a freaking SUPERSTAR on the NYT list for, what, 15 years now? Anyone who reads thrillers KNOWS him. Very very well. And the fact that he uses co-authors (who are credited, when he uses them) on most of his books except the Alex Cross stuff is also well-known and no big secret.
Seems to me the only person to which all of this comes as NEWS is Mahler himself... I mean, Grisham's been on the lists consistently but his books haven't been truly "hot stuff" for at least a decade. King's always there, but he's been around so long that his books have come in and out of vogue more than once. He's on his third wave of "career resurrection" lately, what with UNDER THE DOME being considered his best novel in at least a decade, and his very topical fictional take on the Kennedy Assassination coming up later this year...
And, frankly, Dan Brown doesn't truly belong among a list of names like this. He's mostly a product of the success of the first movie, and a lot of vitriolic reaction/PR from the Catholic church.
Tom Clancy might have been a better choice.
I'm guessing Mahler hasn't realized Charlaine Harris even exists yet... what a clueless journalistic moron. I suspect he occupies the Jayson Blair seat at the New York Times.
I will admit, though, that after basically admitting he's an idiot who didn't know just how big Patterson is before he was assigned to write a story about him, the style of the article settled down quite a bit and went into an impressive amount of depth, detail, and fairness to Patterson.
But those opening few paragraphs are embarrassing.
And... what rock has journalist Johnathan Mahler been living under to write THIS line?
"Patterson may lack the name recognition of a Stephen King, a John Grisham or a Dan Brown, but he outsells them all."
Patterson's been a freaking SUPERSTAR on the NYT list for, what, 15 years now? Anyone who reads thrillers KNOWS him. Very very well. And the fact that he uses co-authors (who are credited, when he uses them) on most of his books except the Alex Cross stuff is also well-known and no big secret.
Seems to me the only person to which all of this comes as NEWS is Mahler himself... I mean, Grisham's been on the lists consistently but his books haven't been truly "hot stuff" for at least a decade. King's always there, but he's been around so long that his books have come in and out of vogue more than once. He's on his third wave of "career resurrection" lately, what with UNDER THE DOME being considered his best novel in at least a decade, and his very topical fictional take on the Kennedy Assassination coming up later this year...
And, frankly, Dan Brown doesn't truly belong among a list of names like this. He's mostly a product of the success of the first movie, and a lot of vitriolic reaction/PR from the Catholic church.
Tom Clancy might have been a better choice.
I'm guessing Mahler hasn't realized Charlaine Harris even exists yet... what a clueless journalistic moron. I suspect he occupies the Jayson Blair seat at the New York Times.
I will admit, though, that after basically admitting he's an idiot who didn't know just how big Patterson is before he was assigned to write a story about him, the style of the article settled down quite a bit and went into an impressive amount of depth, detail, and fairness to Patterson.
But those opening few paragraphs are embarrassing.
