When you're writing your review, remember....

[Sarah]

...although your overall critique is probably worth its weight in gold to the author, your review also might serve another purpose. Publicity.

Not just to say "Oh, this person reviewed my book, go see it on their blog! Aren't I important to have a book reviewed on someone's blog?" Rather, an author might want to snippet out a piece of your review AS A QUOTE to use in marketing the book. You know what I mean. Those quotes you see on the covers of books you read? They come from reviewers, you know?

Sometimes the reviewer is also a colleague/author and sometimes they are just a publishing magazine but there are reviewers (or readers) who say things which are just so amazingly heart-warming, an author (or their PR agent) will want to splash those words in front of as many eyes as possible!

I've just done up a "Press & Publicity" page for my alter-ego, Marjorie "Friday" Baldwin over at the Phoenician Series Blog:

http://phoenicianseries.blogspot.com/...

I'd love comments/feedback on the aesthetics of the site and/or the publicity page itself but I was writing this note for another reason entirely.

I copied 3 quotes from the comments left by beta readers of the chapters I've uploaded to Authonomy. They actually sound "professional" to me! Is it just me? Am I just giddy to get such positive feedback I don't realize they're not really great quotes?

A member of this group, Cassie, was kind enough to take the time to read--and comment individually!--on my chapters. Unfortunately, although I read her comments twice, there wasn't anything "quoteable" in there. I wanted sooooo badly to quote her but she phrased things such that I'd have had to rewrite her remarks to do it...and that's not a quote. So I chose other commentators' remarks.

I figured I'd say something here, so anyone thinking of writing a review of anyone's work now or in the future can think about this or have it somewhere in the back of your brain while choosing your words. As you proofread your piece, just ask yourself, Is there any quoteable quote in here? If the answer's no, you might want to put one in. It gets you additional publicity, too! It's a win/win that keeps on giving ^_^

[Anagha Uppal]

Thank you for the post! I'll keep that in mind when I'm writing my review the next time...

[Dale]

Good point! I love the press and publicity page you created. What a grand idea! Looks professional.

[Cambria]

You have lots of great ideas Sarah!!

[Sarah]

Dale wrote: "Good point! I love the press and publicity page you created. What a grand idea! Looks professional."

Thanks, Dale. I couldn't believe I only had 5 comments--two from Cassie which I loved in terms of author feedback but which I couldn't suck a quoteable quote out of no matter how hard I tried--and still got 3 snazzy sounding press-style quotes! I must have super high-quality readers :-)

Thanks, Cambria. I have lots of ideas, I dunno about the greatness of them. And worse, I tend to just blurt them out with gushing enthusiasm and forget that not everyone in the world loves the way my mind works. Say, Cambria, where are YOUR comments on my chapters at Authonomy? (hint hint hint)

I'm soooo struggling to get Ch 4 edits done. It's not going up this week. There are just massive plot developments in Ch 4 which need to be edited/changed and making those changes to the plot are the whole point of my current process. Getting reads and marketing quotes is just icing on the cake, not the point. I need to stay focused on the point.