I’m going to discuss a couple of things in this article, but I’ll start with the most important bit first:

1.  I am now initiating an open submission call!

So if you’re an author, whether traditionally, independently or self-published and want your book reviewed, you are free to request a review.  THIS IS ON THE CONDITION YOUR BOOK FITS MY REVIEW POLICY!!!  As always, I reserve the right to accept or request your book on a case-by-case basis.  I’m expecting quite a few submissions because of my big submissions announcement, so don’t be surprised if I’m closed for business pretty soon.

2.  If you had submitted your book to me last time and haven’t heard back from me, you are free to resubmit.

I may have accidentally deleted your email and for that I apologize.  Admitting this here on my blog is pretty embarrassing, but I have a feeling I actually did do this to someone.  It’s not because I hate you or your book; it’s because I’m a disorganized idiot.  You are now my top priority and once you resubmit your book, can expect a review in 1-2 days.

3.  I will now be prioritizing requests.

No, this is not because I want to pick favourites.  I will now be officially prioritizing requests to make things a little more fair.  Here is the order in which I will be reading books:

1. Any resubmitted requests because I accidentally deleted an author’s email.
2. Anyone who sends me print copies.
3. Authors who sent me the first book in a series, got a good review and want to send me their second book.
4. Everyone else on a first come, first serve basis.

#1 seems pretty obvious to me, but #2 may be a bit controversial.  As a matter of personal preference, I love print copies because reading on the computer too long hurts my eyes.  I don’t have an e-reader so I can take print copies with me everywhere and usually finish them immediately.  From an author’s perspective they are taking the risk by spending their own money to send a print copy of their book all the way up to Canada for a possibly bad review.  So if they take that risk, the least I can do is give them a much quicker, but still honest, book review.

#3 actually serves a more practical purpose: I read a lot of books.  As a result, if I wait a couple months to read through my entire list before starting the second book in a series, I often forget who the characters are and what they did and get confused.  However, #3 is conditional.  I absolutely have my limits on how many books in a series an author can send me and this is only applicable for first books I give a rating of 4+ stars.

4.  I will be better at updating my In Progress page.

Before I closed submissions and afterwards, I sucked at updating my In Progress page, I know.  I would often change the dates in which I expected to start books.  But no more!  Authors, you can be reasonably sure that whatever timeline I give you on that page now is more concrete than before.  It won’t be perfect, but I promise it will be better.