Many thanks to those who provided feedback a fortnight ago about the kinds of topics you would most like to see discussed at 17th Street in the future. As I’m currently too swamped with work to research/write about anything specific to the books this week, I thought that I would take the opportunity to share some of the trends from the feedback survey instead.
Every survey respondent indicated that they had read both The Alienist and The Angel of Darkness, which is probably not too surprising given the primary focus of this website. However, I was pleased to see that most respondents indicated that they had also read at least one other book of Mr. Carr’s, with The Italian Secretary and Killing Time the most common of his non-Alienist books to have been read.
Consistent with the preceding trend, the overwhelming majority of respondents indicated that they would prefer to read about topics on the blog related to the historical aspects of the Alienist books, with subject matter related to the literary aspects of the Alienist books the second most popular choice. There was also reasonable interest expressed in topics related to the historical aspects of Mr. Carr’s other novels, although there appears to be less interest in the literary aspects of these other novels or general topics related to Mr. Carr’s non-fiction work.
Perhaps the most interesting trend that I observed lay with the types of history topics respondents were most interested in reading about for the Alienist books. Social history related to the Alienist books was the most popular topic by a relatively narrow margin, with a fairly even spread of interest between New York history and true crime as the second most popular topics, and the history of psychology and the history of forensic science as the third most popular topics. Most respondents ticked multiple boxes for this question, which is why there is a fairly even spread among the second and third most popular topics.
Regarding which of Mr. Carr’s non-Alienist books respondents were most interested in reading about, The Legend of Broken was by far the most popular choice, with The Italian Secretary and Killing Time coming equal second. I can only suppose that even though respondents haven’t necessarily read The Legend of Broken, there is considerable curiosity among Mr. Carr’s readership about the new book, so I will do what I can to cover topics that might be helpful in addressing the types of questions Mr. Carr’s readers might have about Broken.
I also received some very creative and interesting new content suggestions and ideas about the 20th anniversary coming up next March, many of which I couldn’t possibly have come up with on my own. I won’t review these now but rest assured that your ideas have been heard and I will be doing my best to implement the most feasible of the suggestions over the coming months.