Tagged: literature
The True Confessions of a Book Reviewer
I’m approaching my ninth month as a book reviewer, even though it doesn’t feel like it and I’ve been reflecting a lot on my blog and book reviewing in general. It wasn’t until I saw this article on The Perpetual Page-Turner that I realized a lot of other reviewers experience the same things. Well, here are my confessions:
1. There are times when I don’t want to get out of bed, let alone write a review.
I love writing reviews and when I really love a book, writing a review is easy. However, when there are mixed elements in a book it’s hard to write a review. You have to balance out the good and the bad and say why certain aspects were bad. Writing-wise, it’s much more difficult than to gush, but it needs to be done. I owe it to my readers and the author to write a fair review, but that doesn’t make it any easier to write when I have writer’s block. There are some days when I don’t even want to get out of bed to go to work and make money, let alone write a review for fun.
I go through the occasional period of writing trouble and feel under-appreciated; I’m not ashamed to admit that. But then I get that one comment that makes my day and gives me new motivation to write through the good and bad times. It’s comments that expand upon the article, promote discussion and show that someone appreciates what I’m doing that give me the motivation to keep writing every day. To some it may seem pathetic, but it’s that occasional thoughtful comment that makes my day, especially when I’ve had a long day at work. Continue reading
The Best and Worst of August
In case you’re not familiar with my “The Best and Worst of…” series, here’s the deal: every month I reflect on my statistics and tell you the top 5 most viewed posts and the top 5 least viewed posts—the best and worst of that month. So what was popular and what wasn’t in August? Well, here are the top 5 articles and reviews (site announcements are not counted) for August:
1. The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
3. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
4. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Although school doesn’t start until September 4 here in Saskatchewan, in some places in America (where most of my traffic is from) it has already been in session for a few weeks. This is why all of my top posts seem to be from students doing homework research for novel study as all four of the books listed here are typical novel study novels.
School being back in session is also why my overall traffic is up from 4, 350 views in July (when everyone is on vacation) to 4, 846 in August (a larger spike than I predicted). It helps that I broke a personal record for views per day, which now stands at 305. That doesn’t sound like much and really, it isn’t, but it smashed my old record of 246 views in one day. The weirdest part of that record? It was broken on a Thursday, which is traditionally one of my worst days for traffic, aside from Sundays.
Well, enough about views per day, let’s bring on the five worst posts of August!
1. The Bad Queen by Carolyn Meyer
2. YA Release Dates to Look Forward to
3. Emperor: The Field of Swords by Conn Iggulden
4. Some Thoughts on the YA Genre
5. Isabel: Jewel of Castilla by Carolyn Meyer
I’m not surprised at all to see two Carolyn Meyer books on the bottom 5 because despite being a great historical fiction writer, her popularity has waned over the years. ‘Ya Release Dates to Look Forward to’ is no surprise either because most of the dates listed are now irrelevant as the books have been released by now!
‘Some Thoughts on the YA Genre’ is sort of misleading at #4 because although it didn’t gather many views here on my blog, Mark over at The Masquerade Crew used it as a syndicated post and soon my timeline was flooded with people tweeting about it. I assume that at least half of the people tweeting about it actually read it, so that’s more than enough to put it out of the bottom 5.
Well, that’s it for August! My overall traffic is up now and I expect it to spike again as pretty much all schools will be in session at the end of the long weekend. September will also feature more guest posting than usual because Caleb from 20four12 and I have worked out an arrangement that sees us guest posting for each other every other Friday. My first post for him will be on September 7, then he will post for me on the 14th and so on and so forth.
If you’re looking to guest post for The Mad Reviewer, please read this article. I look forward to hearing from you soon!
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.
Books that Should be Taught in School
1. The Accidental Hero by Matt Myklusch
Two words: killer robots.
Yeah, you read that right. The Accidental Hero has everything kids love (killer robots, superheros and adventure) while including themes educators love to over-analyze (friendship, doing the right thing and believing in yourself). It also will actually appeal to boys, who are incredibly neglected in both children’s and young adult literature. Besides, with excellent writing, sympathetic characters, and incredible world-building, kids will be able to enjoy novel study for once. Continue reading
Book Reviewing Criteria
[UPDATE 29/01/13: It breaks my heart to say this, but The Mad Reviewer is no longer accepting submissions for review. If you’ve contacted me as of 2:04pm CT, I’ll still process your request. However, I am not accepting any new submissions. Check back in 1-2 months and we’ll see if I’m open for business.]
Since I started accepting book review requests from authors, I’ve had a surprisingly large response. As much as I would like to, there aren’t nearly enough hours in a day to read all of them. Therefore, in order to get a review, you must follow the instructions and guidelines below or I will reject your request.
What I Review
- Teen-targeted self-help
- All of the major YA genres: romance, fantasy, sci-fi, historical, realistic, etc.
- Nonfiction teens would be interested in.
- Self-published fiction that fits the above guidelines.
What I WILL NOT Review
- Erotica. Not interested, people.
- Spiritual fiction. I will not touch religion on this blog.
- Poetry. Unless you’re Dante, Homer or Virgil.
- Short stories (unless they’re in an anthology).
- Any unpublished work.
So your book fits the criteria, great! What do you do next?
1. You must contact me via the Contact page here on my blog.
2. I check my email three times per day, so I expect you to at check it at least once. I don’t like waiting around for an author’s reply for days.
3. You must have a blog and/or official website as well as membership to 2 or more social media outlets like Facebook, Twitter, Fark, Reddit, etc. If I have to take time out of my day to read and review your book, you had better take the time to publicize my review, but only if it’s good. I certainly don’t expect you to publicize a bad review.
4. When you contact me, you must be able to provide me a free copy either in PDF or paperback. I personally prefer physical copies of books, but I know shipping to Canada can be costly.
5. When you give me a free copy of your book, it does not guarantee you a good review. I give full disclosure in a review when an author has contacted me to prevent any conflicts of interest. I review all of the books I read honestly and if you don’t like it, don’t bother wasting my time.
6. You may mention if you want to do a giveaway or interview, but you must wait until I publish your review before we actually go through with it. I’m not going to do a giveaway for a book I didn’t like. You must also have a sizable enough social network to promote it through so I can actually get more than 5 entries. Otherwise, it’s just a waste of my time and your money.
I reserve the right to accept or refuse your request on a case-by-case basis. I also reserve the right to call you out publicly on my blog if I feel you have mistreated me (as in name-calling, excessive snarkiness or anything that could be called ‘cyber bullying’). When you submit your novel to me, you are acknowledging that if you are rude to me that you may become the subject of one of my articles and/or that your words may be included at the bottom of my review of your book for all to see. These guidelines are in effect as of November 27, 2012 and are not retroactive.