Finished reading Scott Smith’s The Ruins the other day and greatly enjoyed it. It’s probably one of the best horror/suspense novels I’ve read in a long time. I’ve already passed it off to my wife so she can read it next — and so we can watch the movie, which comes out on DVD next week. I’m anxious to see how it shapes up against the book. I’m not one of those people who gripes about every little difference from the novel, but since Smith wrote the screenplay, I’m curious to see how it is.

Scott Smith is an interesting writer. The Ruins has done fairly well, commercially and critically, and it’s the author’s first book in something like twelve or thirteen years, since A Simple Plan, which was also quite successful. I looked Smith up online and he doesn’t have a website, and the few interviews I found were nothing more than the usual p.r. fluff. I dug deeper, trawled a few blogs and message boards, and was surprised (although not that much, I must admit) to find that some horror aficionados seem to have a problem with the guy. Not the book, mind you, but the man.

It’s nothing personal, of course. In fact, the reaction is quite similar to the one received by Elizabeth Kostova after the publication of her own breakout hit The Historian. Again, you had a hitherto-unknown author publishing a horror novel that is reviewed well and sells well, but among one particular segment of horror fans, she is seen as having committed some sort of publishing faux pas, apparently because she didn’t start out publishing short stories in the small press. At least that seems to be the gist of it. The argument goes like this: Why should Scott Smith or Elizabeth Kostova get the money and the fame and not… well, enter the small press horror writer of your choice.

It’s a silly argument in itself, but it’s especially insulting to those few writers who are fortunate enough to make that big leap directly to major publishing houses without having to fight in the trenches of the small press. Of the writers I know, most are either working toward full time writing careers or they’re just having fun. I don’t think either group would balk at a contract with a major publishing house if such an offer were presented to them, which makes me think the bitterness directed toward writers like Smith and Kostova is rooted more in jealousy than anything else.

The argument is doubly stupid because regardless of the author’s publishing roots, The Ruins is a damn fine read. If you have a chip on your shoulder about evil “popular fiction,” get over it and check out this book. I think you’ll dig it. I know I did.

• Currently reading: The Trade Mission, by Andrew Pyper