Steven M. Moore's Blog, page 47
June 8, 2020
An Ode to Spring…
Ah, spring!
The flowers sprinkled around this post prove spring has sprung. I hope they improve your mood. They improved mine, which has been slapped around a bit after the pandemics caused by COVID-19 and the murder of George Floyd. That first pandemic is dwindling here in the NYC area, which is no longer the world’s epicenter—Brazil is. That second pandemic is still going on as I write this.
Spring always makes us feel good. The changes in the sun’s angle causing the dark days of winter to mor...
June 4, 2020
Series fatigue…
Readers of this blog know I binged on Faith Martin’s Jenny Starling series, seven Brit-mystery novels (lots of time to read during this pandemic, and reading a novel is much more interesting than any computer game). I reviewed that entire series recently (maybe a first among reviewers?). I started on her Hillary Greene series, which contains twelve books at last count, but I stopped after reading seven. What happened? I found out that binge-reading series can cause fatigue. I got tired of old Hi...
June 3, 2020
The Authors Guild…
This organization should change its name. In spite of all the nice platitudes on its website, it’s not a union for authors. It doesn’t represent the majority of authors at all. What it has become is a tool the Big Five publishing conglomerates and their authors use to rant against self-publishing and independent small presses, the former being those who feel threatened by the latter (they’ve got theirs, so they don’t want any competition). It’s a bit like those old range wars between farmers and...
June 2, 2020
Op-Ed Pages #3: Who is that unmasked man? Incompetence and fascism…
[Note from Steve: As some faithful readers of this blog already know, it originally contained op-ed articles about current issues and events as well as book and movie reviews, author interviews, and articles about reading, writing, and the publishing business (all written in op-ed style). I stopped posting the first type because they often represented too long an investment in time to find the relevant background material and fact-check as much as possible. That said, I believe it’s now time to ...
May 29, 2020
Review of Karpf’s Prelude to Extinction…
Prelude to Extinction. Andreas Karpf, author. I hope Dr. Karpf reads this review because, as one physicist to another (ex-physicist in my case), I say to him, “You, sir, have written one helluva good hard sci-fi novel!” With a low price no Big Five conglomerate’s publisher would even consider, I suppose it’s self-published—Howey’s Wool and Weir’s The Martian were too (initially), and this one deserves more fame.
My summary here could make it sound like space opera, but it’s a solid albeit risky ...
May 28, 2020
What’s with the combos?
I’m an avid reader, mostly of ebooks, so I’m wondering, what’s with the combos? Ebooks are combined with audiobooks, and print book/ebook or audiobook pairings are common now. Can some reader of this blog tell me why a reader would ever want to buy such combos?
I can imagine audiobooks being useful for a commuter or jogger who can “multitask.” Whether such people are actually “reading” anything complex that way is questionable. Maybe they need the ebook or print version to go back and understand...
May 27, 2020
Do book reviews matter?
This is an important question for all authors (for readers, see below). Another one is: Who writes reviews? The two questions are linked, of course, and both need to be answered.
I’ve always offered a free ebook in exchange for an honest review (print books are costly, especially for outside the US), and I thank all those good people who respond to that offer, whether directly or via NetGalley. But do those reviewers get more out of it than I do? That’s not a question reflecting a selfish quid-p...
May 26, 2020
Op-Ed Pages #2: Guns…
[Note from Steve: As some faithful readers of this blog already know, it originally contained op-ed articles about current issues and events as well as book and movie reviews, author interviews, and articles about reading, writing, and the publishing business (all written in op-ed style). I stopped posting the first type because they often represented too long an investment in time to find the relevant background material and fact-check as much as possible. That said, I believe it’s now time to ...
May 25, 2020
Memorial Day Message…
Today is the traditional day for remembering all those who have given their lives defending America in foreign wars, those courageous members of the armed forces who have made the ultimate sacrifice. We tend to confuse this day a bit with Veterans’ Day, which is fine—coming from a family of veterans, there’s nothing wrong with also recognizing those who returned. All members of the Armed Forces should be recognized and applauded for their service.
However, we are now at war within our borders an...
May 22, 2020
News and Notices from the Writing Trenches #181…
A salute. To all those front-line workers who deserve much more than applause and cheers, I salute you. That includes doctors, nurses, maintenance workers, grocery clerks—all who are keeping things going for the rest of us. I also salute the volunteers working in food pantries and aiding in general.
Some of my readers have made many useful suggestions about how we can all help those in the frontlines of this war against the coronavirus…and each other. I’m truly impressed by the sense of communit...
