William Amerman's Blog - Posts Tagged "misanthropicreader"
Holy Crap!
I just got word back from one of the toughest reviewers I've come across that she's finished Sky1 - Foundation. And the part that inspired the title of this blog entry? She freaking rated it 5 stars on Amazon, Goodreads and 4.5 stars on her personal blog.
So why does this inspire such wonderment in me? Validation. Validation that years of work and pretty damned massive editorial expenses and cover design expenses and effort were all worth it.
Because she's not just tough, but seems fair and discerning as well. Yeah, easy for me to say now after she's rated the book so high. But If she doesn't like a book, she doesn't hesitate to rate it poorly. If she likes a book, she rates it well. She seems to read voraciously and I've started to use her book ratings to help me find new stuff to read because her tastes seem to mirror my own.
Some of my fellow writers have accused her of being overly harsh when reviewing their own works. Admittedly, I'm not able to be completely objective, but to me it seems like these writers just don't want to hear anything but praise. I plan to send my next book her way as well, and if she has issues or complaints then I'll take those as areas to explore for improvement. Her one issue with this book was my use of the words immigration vs. emigration, which is right on the money. I struggled with when to use each one for months, then hoped that my ace editor would sort it out. Which, I think she did, but there is some ambiguity in when to use each one. Either way, her comment is right on the mark.
Anyway, she just made my Sunday. Here's a link to her bookslike blog (I hope it's okay to post that here)
http://misanthropicreader.booklikes.c...
So why does this inspire such wonderment in me? Validation. Validation that years of work and pretty damned massive editorial expenses and cover design expenses and effort were all worth it.
Because she's not just tough, but seems fair and discerning as well. Yeah, easy for me to say now after she's rated the book so high. But If she doesn't like a book, she doesn't hesitate to rate it poorly. If she likes a book, she rates it well. She seems to read voraciously and I've started to use her book ratings to help me find new stuff to read because her tastes seem to mirror my own.
Some of my fellow writers have accused her of being overly harsh when reviewing their own works. Admittedly, I'm not able to be completely objective, but to me it seems like these writers just don't want to hear anything but praise. I plan to send my next book her way as well, and if she has issues or complaints then I'll take those as areas to explore for improvement. Her one issue with this book was my use of the words immigration vs. emigration, which is right on the money. I struggled with when to use each one for months, then hoped that my ace editor would sort it out. Which, I think she did, but there is some ambiguity in when to use each one. Either way, her comment is right on the mark.
Anyway, she just made my Sunday. Here's a link to her bookslike blog (I hope it's okay to post that here)
http://misanthropicreader.booklikes.c...
