(After reading other reviews) Can't say I agree with all of Rakuen's points, like regarding the fandom's adult side. For a book aimed at an outside audience, well yeah that's going to be downplayed, and most kinks left undescribed in detail. Heck, the one the author tries out isn't well-known to most people to begin with. The wink-wink-nod-grins thing I mentioned that pops up all over - Boozy Badger's review of the book managed to articulate it very well.
As to things left out, I noticed the North American focus. I'd really like to hear more regional histories of fandoms from other countries, but that's not something easy for this author to do. (Japan, Russia, Australia, etc.) Fred Patten's review mentions skipping over the literary angle. Computer and tabletop gaming culture is skipped too, but it's obvious from the author's comments here and elsewhere that a lot had to be chopped out due to space constraints and editing deadlines! Yeah, too bad about the paperback thing for library copies, it wouldn't survive well on the shelves. Not sure about its paper quality. At least there's also an ebook.
(After reading other reviews) Can't say I agree with all of Rakuen's points, like regarding the fandom's adult side. For a book aimed at an outside audience, well yeah that's going to be downplayed, and most kinks left undescribed in detail. Heck, the one the author tries out isn't well-known to most people to begin with. The wink-wink-nod-grins thing I mentioned that pops up all over - Boozy Badger's review of the book managed to articulate it very well.
As to things left out, I noticed the North American focus. I'd really like to hear more regional histories of fandoms from other countries, but that's not something easy for this author to do. (Japan, Russia, Australia, etc.) Fred Patten's review mentions skipping over the literary angle. Computer and tabletop gaming culture is skipped too, but it's obvious from the author's comments here and elsewhere that a lot had to be chopped out due to space constraints and editing deadlines! Yeah, too bad about the paperback thing for library copies, it wouldn't survive well on the shelves. Not sure about its paper quality. At least there's also an ebook.