OK, fellow writers, let’s talk about swapping reviews.<\/p>\n
I write a lot of reviews on both Goodreads<\/a> and Amazon<\/a>. I read a lot (I’ll talk about what I read in a minute), and I used to be a book editor years ago. I also have a couple of books up in the Kindle Store<\/a> that could do with more reviews.<\/p>\n So my proposal, O Fellow Writer, is that we review each other’s books.<\/p>\n There are terms and conditions, of course, and they are these:<\/p>\n I read mostly fantasy, urban and rural. But I’m not into:<\/p>\n I much prefer werewolves to vampires, and I have a strong aversion to long descriptions of cruelty.<\/p>\n I do not<\/em> zomb.<\/p>\n I read some SF if it’s about how technology affects people (individually or collectively) rather than being all cold and hard (with the people being there mainly to point at the tech).<\/p>\n Post-apocalyptic anything is a turn-off for me, and so is putting the apocalypse in partway through. I’ve abandoned two series which I was, up until then, enjoying when the nuclear bombs went off.<\/p>\n Space opera is absolutely fine and dandy, and I will happily accept genre tropes in place of actual science if you don’t push it too hard.\u00a0<\/p>\n I love<\/em> superhero novels.<\/p>\n Lately, I’ve been reading\u00a0more and more steampunk, too. What I’ve noticed is that some steampunk authors (I name no names here, but read my Goodreads reviews<\/a>) think that a 1930s-style pulp plot, a veneer of Victoriana, and liberal use of the words “brass”, “steam”, “crystals”, “airships”\u00a0and “punch cards” make a good steampunk novel. They do not<\/em>.<\/p>\n My work in progress, which I’m not soliciting reviews for yet, is a steampunkish secondary-world fantasy with a sci-fi skeleton. It’s about heroic civil servants.<\/p>\n I have two (fiction) books up on Amazon at the moment. City of Masks<\/a> <\/em>is a nonmagical fantasy – it’s in a secondary world, but the spec-fic aspect is sociological, not magical or technological. It’s told\u00a0in the form of diary entries, with a “period language” feel, though it’s not the language of any actual historical period. Here’s the teaser:<\/p>\n In the city-state of Bonvidaeo, by custom and law everyone must wear a mask and act in character with it, or face civil, social and religious penalties.<\/p>\n Gregorius Bass is sent to Bonvidaeo as the Envoy of Calaria, mainly to get him out from underfoot. Masked as the Innocent Man, and in the company of his radical young Bonvidaoan servant, Bass stumbles into mystery, intrigue, heresy and murder.<\/p>\n (Imagine if G.K. Chesterton and Alexandre Dumas adapted Pepys’ diary into a serial killer mystery set in a mad version of Shakespeare’s Italy. With wasps.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Gu<\/a><\/em> is an SF\u00a0novella set on Earth\u00a0in\u00a0an unspecified part of the 21st century, but probably at least 30 years from now. It’s told in the second person, in the form of a documentary. (Yes, I do like to experiment, why do you ask?)<\/p>\n Teaser:<\/p>\n Gu is the last industrial product, the substance that can be anything – programmable matter for the masses. Fifteen years after its launch, follow documentary filmmaker Susan Halwaz as she interviews the creators, users and opponents of Gu about how it’s changed society.<\/p>\n A Charles Stross-esque novella of future technology and its discontents.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n If, having read all that, you want to participate in the review swap, get in touch with me and\u00a0we can swap ebooks. Either leave a comment (which will give me your email address), contact me on Google+<\/a>, or just email masks at csidemedia.com.<\/p>\n Excelsior!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" OK, fellow writers, let’s talk about swapping reviews. I write a lot of reviews on both Goodreads and Amazon. I read a lot (I’ll talk about what I read in a minute), and I used to be a book editor … Continue reading \n
What I read<\/h3>\n
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What I write<\/h3>\n
How to proceed<\/h3>\n