Calling all Writers!

Are you a short story writer and have been aching for a chance to have your work published in an anthology?  Have you been sitting on that time-travel story, waiting for a market?  Well, look no further!

No, yours truly is not publishing an anthology.  I have enough on my plate at the moment (more on that later).  However, one of my blogging friends, Mark Lee from The Masquerade Crew, is.  Here is the prompt for the anthology:

In the spirit of H.G. Well’s “The Time Machine,” one character or a group of characters travel many years into the future. What do they find there? Are they able to come back home, or are they trapped? What has become of mankind? Is life better or worse? What’s the political climate? The real climate? (IOW mother nature) The choices are up to you.

The minimum word count for all short stories is 5,000 words and the maximum word count is 10,000 words.  Since Mark is just getting into publishing, the anthology will only be available as an ebook, but the future holds endless possibilities.

One of the huge advantages of entering your story for consideration in this particular anthology is that Mark has always been, and likely always will be, an advocate for indie and self-published authors.  That means, if your story is accepted, you will be included in the publishing process: editing, cover design, the works.  Unlike in major publishing houses, your opinions will be heard and considered.  It also means that you, not Mark, will retain the copyright of your story.

Okay, so you’re probably asking yourself: who’s going to do the editing?  Will you have to hire an editor?  This is where my involvement starts.

I’m going to be one of the editors of the anthology.

Yes, I’m finally expanding my repertoire beyond book reviewing, but don’t worry!  I’m not about to give up The Mad Reviewer anytime soon; I’m having far too much fun for that.  However, it does give me a chance to work closer with authors than I have before and get paid for doing what I love (as I obviously don’t make any money from my blog).

The best part is that the anthology is going to put more power into the hands of authors as well as indie publishers.  So if you’re interested in submitting a short story for the anthology, or even just asking more questions, you can email Mark at msl_007atlivedotcom.

3 Pieces of Advice Authors (Should) Ignore

There is a lot of advice for authors out there and, as such, there is a lot of advice out there that is mediocre or just plain bad.  Here are some examples of wretched advice I’ve found on writing sites and why authors should just plain ignore it.

You don’t want to be this guy, do you?

1.  Never read reviews.

This lovely little piece of advice has been around a long time and is in practically every book and blog about writing ever.  9 times out of 10, it makes me burst out into hysterical laughter.  Why?

Because no one follows it.

Well, I shouldn’t say that.  I mean: 99 out of 100 authors who have access to the internet never follow it.  We humans are curious by nature, especially when it comes to the opinions of our fellow humans on something we’ve worked hard at.  The internet makes this curiosity pretty much unbearable because book reviews are so accessible, therefore at one time or another, an author is going to read someone’s review of their book.

How do I know this?  I’m a book reviewer, of course.  My reviews have been read by Matt Myklusch, Krystal Wade, Michelle Hansen and Mira Grant, just to name a few.  The first three I mention contacted me via my blog or email and Mira Grant mentioned me on her blog in a round-up of reviews of her books.  Keep in mind that these are just the authors I know for certain have read my reviews.  I’m pretty sure more have stumbled across my blog.

I do have to add one caveat to my derision of this advice: you shouldn’t read reviews if you’re sensitive.  No matter how amazing your book is, you will get a bad review and it will hurt.  Now, if you’ve already developed thick skin, this will be a minor hurt you can just brush off or even laugh about.  However, if you haven’t developed that thick skin that’s necessary in the publishing industry, you really shouldn’t ignore this advice. Continue reading →

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl

(Cover picture courtesy of What’s new @ CDPL?)

Charlie Bucket’s wonderful adventure begins when he finds one of Mr. Willy Wonka’s precious Golden Tickets and wins a whole day inside the mysterious chocolate factory.  Little does he know the surprises that are in store for him!

This is no doubt a classic children’s novel and both of the movie adaptations (the first one starring Gene Wilder and the awful modern one starring Johnny Depp) hardly do it justice.  They don’t capture how creative the songs of the Oompa-Loompas were, the story of the chocolate factory and Willy Wonka or the hilarious caricature personalities of the children and adults.

What sets Charlie and the Chocolate Factory apart from many children’s novels is that Roald Dahl didn’t talk down to his readers.  There are a lot of things children will catch onto, but there are also a lot of elements adults reading the novel will enjoy as well.  How do I know?  Because I read it aloud to my little sister as part of my plan to get her to love reading.  She didn’t catch all of the subtleties of Roald Dahl’s writing, but we both had a good time, which is the mark of an excellent children’s book.

Charlie Bucket is an excellent character for children.  He’s sympathetic and is truly good at heart, in stark contrast to the other children who win the golden tickets.  The adventures he and his grandfather go on are fantastic and Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory is a very vivid world, brought to life by Quentin Blake’s wonderful illustrations (at least, in my edition) and Roald Dahl’s incomparable writing.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a popular children’s novel for a reason and I believe it will stand the test of time to go down as one of the greatest children’s novels of all time.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

Amazon    Barnes and Noble

Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox by Eoin Colfer

(Cover picture courtesy of the Reader Store.)

When Artemis Fowl’s mother contracts a life-threatening illness, his world is turned upside down.  The only hope for a cure lies in the brain fluid of the silky sifaka lemur.  Unfortunately, the animal is extinct, thanks to the money-hungry deeds of a younger Artemis.

Though the odds are stacked against him, Artemis is not willing to give up.  With the help of his fairy friends, the young genius travels back in time to save the lemur and bring it to the present.  But to do  so, Artemis will have to defeat a maniacal poacher, who has set his sights on new prey: Holly Short.

The rules of time travel are far from simple, but to save his mother, Artemis will have to break them all…and outsmart his most cunning adversary yet: Artemis Fowl, age ten.

Ah, time travel.  It’s definitely a complicated subject in fiction and very few writers can truly pull it off, but for the most part, Eoin Colfer is one of them.  What’s interesting is that when Artemis and Holly travel back in time, they age differently.  As a result, Artemis is suddenly older and Holly is suddenly younger, as in the human equivalent of a teenager.

If you haven’t guessed what’s going to happen already, I’m disappointed in you because it’s so typical of YA: romantic tension.  When I first read The Time Paradox, I was pretty angry about Eoin Colfer forcing the tension between Holly and Artemis, but now I’m just slightly disappointed.  It felt like he caved in to the demand that romance has to be part of every YA book, although thankfully things were sorted out in the end.

We learn a lot more about Artemis’ ‘childhood’ and why he was quite the sociopath when we met him in the first book.  With a childhood like he had, assuming the role of man of the house at the age of ten, wouldn’t you be a sociopath too?  Having the older, more human Artemis meet his ruthless younger self was one of the highlights of the whole novel.  In addition to Artemis’ expanded backstory, we also get to learn more about Holly and how her mother died.

There were a few rough spots (see the aforementioned ‘romance’), but overall I enjoyed The Time Paradox.  It had an excellent plot that sets up the next two books, helped expand on the backstories of main characters and showed just how far Artemis has really come since the beginning of the series.

I give this book 3.5/5 stars.

Amazon     Barnes and Noble

My Interview with Matt Myklusch

Matt Myklusch is the author of the Jack Blank series, where the main character, Jack Blank, is introduced to a secret world called the Imagine Nation that’s full of superheroes—and super villains.  Here is the interview I conducted with him via email in which we discuss future projects, the road to being published for him and how the future isn’t written—literally.

1.  I know you probably get this a lot, but where did the inspiration for the Jack Blank trilogy come from?

It all comes from a love of comic books, really. I wanted to showcase the comic book world that fired my imagination as a kid, and maybe introduce it to people who have never seen it before. If you didn’t grow up reading comic books, you might not be familiar with a world full of heroes, villains, aliens, robots, ninjas, and more. That’s what it’s like in the comics… it’s normal to see heroes fighting villains in the middle of the street on a random Tuesday. It’s commonplace to see a man flying through the air and shooting lasers out of his eyes. The city is full of guys like that, you see them everywhere you look. I wanted to show that world. A world where the impossible happens every day. I decided the best way to introduce it to the reader was through the eyes of a child going there for the first time. That became Jack, and everything else kind of grew out of him.

Continue reading →