In the book industry, fall also means it's awards season. From the Giller to the Booker to the National Book Award, there are a number of high profile awards announced leading up to the Christmas Holidays (and of course the ALA Youth Media Awards in January). A few weeks ago when the Governor General's Award winners were announced in Canada, I read an article about the awards that was marveling at the fact that for the first time, the shortlisted titles were also on the national bestseller list. What really threw me was the part where they specifically mentioned having a discussion about whether or not they should be giving awards to titles that are also popular. Essentially, the article was suggesting that good writing and popular appeal either are or should be separate, and the book was given the award in spite of being a bestseller. The article went on to state that if popular merit was a consideration for publishing books,