The Bookseller.com

20th November 2008

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The Gargoyle is Amazon's Rising Star

06.10.08 Graeme Neill

Canongate's The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson has been chosen by Amazon.co.uk's users as its Rising Star after an eight week campaign on the website.

One book per week was promoted on a dedicated Amazon page, offering customers new material such as author interviews and videos. Customers were invited to review and rate each title on the site. The Gargoyle received the most positive reviews, with 38 customers giving it a five star rating.

"Customers seemed to find the book really interesting with one reviewer comparing it to [Yann Martel's] Life of Pi," said Amy Worth, lead account manager for books at Amazon.co.uk. One reviewer, carlosnightman, described the book as "an accomplished, confident, self-depricating, chaotic beauty of a novel".

The book will now be marketed across Amazon.co.uk's website. Customers were also emailed about the winner today [Monday, 6th October].

The titles were either débuts or a second novels and the shortlist was selected by seven buyers on Amazon.co.uk's book team. Publishers did not have to pay any additional marketing costs to include their books in the promotion.

The shortlist comprised:

City of the Sun by David Levien (Bantam)
The Story of a Marriage by Andrew Sean Greer (Faber)
The Gone-Away World by Nick Harkaway (Heinemann)
Gardens of Water by Alan Drew (Bloomsbury)
The Good Plain Cook by Bethan Roberts (Serpent's Tail)
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski (Fourth Estate)
The Eyes of the King by Catherine Banner (Corgi Children's)
The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson (Canongate)

Book Amazon.co.uk Graeme Neill The Gargoyle Rising Star