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What Do Authors Want from Reviewers?

August 14, 2008 @ 12:23 am

There’s an amusing comment string that’s cropped up on the Amazon page for MultiReal around Harriet Klausner’s review of the book. It began when Klausner, the (in)famous #1 reviewer on Amazon, gave MultiReal a five-star review, and folks started piling on to diss it. Then I broke the cardinal author/reviewer rule — Thou Shalt Not Criticize Thine Book’s Reviews — by saying this:

Normally I wouldn’t comment on a review of my books, but in this case I’ll make an exception. Looks like *someone* read the book, or at least skimmed it, since that bit about “Natch plead[ing] with the Melbourne legislature to no avail” isn’t in the back cover copy. (But to reinforce your point, Ghost of M, she does get that plot point wrong. It’s not Natch, but his mentor Serr Vigal, who pleads before the Melbourne legislature.)

Hard for an author to complain about a 5-star review, though, especially when it’s the only reader review currently up on Amazon…

The discussion continues on from there, and it’s still ongoing.

So now I’ve been inspired to write a little piece here answering the question: what do authors want from reviews of their work anyway? I can’t speak for anybody other than myself on this one, but what I want is very simple:

1. Opinion. Have one. Better yet: have several.
2. Honesty. Love it? Hate it? Moved? Unimpressed? Offended? Enraptured? All I want is your honest opinion, whether it’s favorable to me or not. Don’t worry about the politics, don’t worry about the personalities, don’t worry about what’s popular or unpopular in the stores or what other critics are saying. What do you think?
3. Insight. I want to know that you engaged with my work. Whether you loved it or hated it is not always the point; I want to know that you thought about it. And if my book left you with a soul-crushing emptiness that sucks light out of the universe? That’s fine too, as long as you gave the book a fair shot. Skimmers and summarizers don’t impress me.
4. Elaboration. I can handle the fact that you found the book far-fetched. But I want to know how and where. Specific examples help. Better yet, specific quotations that you took the time to type verbatim from the text.
5. Disclosure. Are you and I up for the same award? Are you the brother of the guy I dissed in an article on my blog? Are you a specialist in the field that I’m writing about? Are you my uncle? None of these things disqualifies you from writing a useful review of my books. I just want to know.
6. No anonymity. There’s a reason Slashdot’s default label for commenters who don’t leave their names is “Anonymous Coward.” Give your review a byline. It doesn’t necessarily have to be your full name or your real name; just don’t say something provocative and then duck behind the shield of anonymity. I want to know something about you; I want to be able to put your opinions about my work in some kind of context.
7. Originality. Anyone can find a detailed summary of MultiReal on the website, or on Amazon, or in other reviews for that matter. Anybody can toss around the phrases “high octane,” “edge of your seat,” and “page turner.” Feel free to confirm impressions that other readers have had, but I’m much more impressed when I see some positive or negative tidbit that I haven’t seen before.
8. Accuracy. Probably not the most important point, but important nonetheless. I can forgive misspellings of minor characters’ names; I can forgive that you said the assassination by beer bottle bludgeoning took place in Barcelona instead of Madrid. But when you completely mangle entire plot threads because you weren’t paying attention, you’re just wasting my time.
9. No pandering. It’s nice to be quotable, and yes, quotable blurbs can often find their way into the front matter of the next book. But please, don’t say pithy things just for the sake of trying to get on the book jacket or the website.
10. No spoilers. It’s not for my sake that you should avoid spoilers; it’s for the sake of my (potential) readers. When a review blithely spoils a suspenseful plot element a third of the way into the novel — like this review of MultiReal from SFRevu does — well, it’s irritating.

By the standards listed above, I’d have to say that the most interesting and plain useful reviews I’ve read of my books are probably Paul Kincaid’s take on Infoquake for the New York Review of Science Fiction, Norman Spinrad’s discussion about Infoquake in Asimov’s, and Jason Pettus’ detailed review of Infoquake on the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography.

Mostly positive reviews, true, but not wholly positive reviews. Paul Kincaid calls Infoquake “a brisk, well-told science fiction adventure set in the normally unadventurous world of business”; but he also takes me to task for the silly character names, the preponderance of appendices, and the backwards-looking historical quotations. He complains about the science. But Kincaid’s review did something that other wholly uncritical five-star reviews did not: it had an impact on the writing of books 2 and 3. Specifically, his point about the improbability of a multi-generational dynasty like the Surinas caused me to rethink certain background elements of the plot that will come to the forefront in Geosynchron. It cast a light on some ideas about the Surinas that I had been toying with beforehand but never quite parsed out.

I don’t know about you, but that’s the kind of impact I want to have on the authors I review.

Denvention Recapitulation

August 11, 2008 @ 9:46 pm

So I didn’t win the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, as you might have noticed by now. Conventional Wisdom said the award would go to Scott Lynch, but Conventional Wisdom has a tendency to tease people like that. Instead the Campbell tiara went to my good friend, the short story writer Mary Robinette Kowal (seen below onstage wearing said tiara). Shows you that the Campbell Award contest has just devolved into a crass competition of who has the most friends. Oh, and the most talent. And the best writing. And the most promising future, and the record of giving back the most to the SF community.

Jeez. Screw that.

At the Hugo ceremony, me and my buddies Lou Anders, Ian McDonald, John Picacio, and Paul Cornell went 0 for 5 on awards. But I was encouraged to discover that, according to the official numbers (PDF), I received the second most number of Campbell nominations (only behind Mr. Lynch) and I came in third in the final tally out of a field of six. Not too shabby considering that I published absolutely nothing in 2007, the year under consideration.

But aside from that, how was the con? I hear you asking. The answer: I had a terrific time at Denvention, in spite of the con’s many challenges. Challenges such as being spread out over a convention hall so large it took you twenty minutes to get anywhere. Such as having all the parties and some of the programming in various hotels several blocks away. Such as having a dealer’s room far away from everything, which sat half-empty most of the time.

Highlights of my Denvention experience included:

• Hanging out at the Hyatt bar and the nearby 24-hour diner until the wee hours of the night with the aforementioned Lou Anders, Ian McDonald, John Picacio, and Paul Cornell, not to mention Chris Roberson, Allison Baker, Deanna Hoak, Sean Williams, Daryl Gregory, John Scalzi, Alan Beatts, Jay Lake, Matt Jarpe, David J. Williams, John Joseph Adams, Rani Graff, and Jetse de Vries.
• Meeting the lovely and hilarious Liza Groen Trombi, Executive Editor at Locus, and discussing all things Locus and all things parenting. I don’t think I quite managed to flirt my way into a cover article, but I’m still working on it.
• Chatting with io9 head honchos Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders, the latter of whom is currently reading Infoquake for an io9 review. (Did I mention how lovely, charming, interesting, and articulate these two are?)
• Attending the Pyr panel hosted by Lou Anders (and featuring fellow authors Kay Kenyon, Chris Roberson, Sean Williams, Mike Resnick, and Alexis Glynn Latner) and the Pyr party in honor of Brasyl author Ian McDonald.
• Talking the ins and outs of publishing with Paolo Bacigalupi, who writes some namby-pamby liberal environmental crap in his new SF collection from Night Shade, Pump Six. Turns out he’s hysterical, interesting, and even nice.
• Meeting fantasy author and fellow SFNovelists.com member David B. Coe in the flesh, and discovering that we have very similar outlooks on life and senses of humor. We now have matching tattoos on our upper thighs.
• Attending one of the best sushi dinners of my life with the hilarious Doselle Young, the fabulously sexy Alethea Kontis, the talented Mary Robinette Kowal, the aforementioned David B. Coe, the delightful Misty Massey, and the almost-unbearably nice Eric James Stone, and one other person whose name is eluding me right now. We spent most of the time prying into Alethea’s love life over sake and offering her unsolicited commentary and suggestions.
• Sharing several panels with Warren Hammond, author of KOP, who is really much too friendly and unassuming to have written a book with a cover like this one on the right.
• Finally meeting and chatting about the writing of second novels with fantasy powerhouses Patrick Rothfuss and Ken Scholes at Joe and Gay Haldeman’s Rising Stars reception.
• Meeting newly minted SF novelist brothers Eytan and Dani Kollin, whose upcoming The Unincorporated Man features a future Earth where free market capitalism has run amuck. Which means I should either be welcoming them into the fold of economic SF writers, or hunting them down and killing them as potential competitors.
• Gabbing at the Aussie party about foreign rights with fantasist Pamela Freeman, who really seems much too nice to be in this business.
• A raucous dinner with (among others) Mario Acevedo, author of The Undead Kama Sutra and admitted deranged mind, Jeremy Lassen, unflappable zoot suited impresario of Night Shade Books, Irene Gallo, keen-eyed Art Director for Tor Books, Paolo Bacigalupi, and Jetse de Vries. John Scalzi may brag about being in the group that thought up the market segment of “unicorn bukkake,” but I was in the group that dreamt up “YA zombie porn.” (Interestingly enough, Paolo is the only person who was part of both groups…)
• Breakfast and con story swapping with the ever-interesting, ever-gracious Alis Rasmussen, aka Kate Elliott.
• Watching the unending line of signature seekers in the dealers room for Elizabeth Moon, while I sat in the next chair over and smiled pleasantly at the half-dozen who decided to seek out my signature. (Ms. Moon seemed almost embarrassed about the disparity, and assured me many times that she had been in my shoes before.)
• Post-con recapping over beer at the Denver airport with fellow DC area writer David J. Williams.

Believe it or not, those are just the highlights. My apologies to anyone whom I may have hung out with/chatted with/drank with/gotten tattoos with and didn’t mention here, but there’s only so much time I can spend recapping this stuff.

Update 8/11/08 @ 10:08 pm: Can’t believe I forgot to give a shout out to my buddies at Solaris, George Mann, Christian Dunn, and Mark Newton, among whom I spent many hours drinking and schmoozing. Always good to see those guys.

Update 8/12/08 @ 8:48 am: Patrick Nielsen Hayden reminds me that the photo credit for Mary Robinette Kowal is his, and that the photo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license. Thanks, PNH! Sorry, didn’t intend to imply this photo was my own.

Things to Do in Denver When You’re Dave

August 5, 2008 @ 10:21 pm

I.e., my WorldCon schedule this week in Denver, CO.

• Reading Tolkien in the Early Years (Wednesday, 11:30 am)
• Why Didn’t SF Predict the Internet? (Thursday, 10 am)
• Reading from Infoquake and MultiReal (Thursday, 1 pm)
• Rising Stars Reception (Thursday, 2:30pm - 5 pm)
  
• Emerging Technologies: The Top Ten Jobs of 2050 Don’t Exist Today (Friday, 4 pm)
• Pyr Books Presentation (Friday, 5:30 pm)
  
• Hugo Reception and Ceremony (Friday, 5:30 pm - 8 pm)
• Signing (Sunday, 11:30 am)

In general, if you’re looking to find me, check the hotel bars. Not because I intend to drink like a fish, but because that’s where everyone hangs out at these cons. (And that doesn’t mean that I don’t intend to drink like a fish.)

You can always email me as well. I’ll have my BlackBerry with me, and if my past experience with T-Mobile service is any guideline, there will be at least a 4′x4′ space in the Denver area that gets reception sufficient for me to pick up an email.

“MultiReal”: The First Drafts

August 2, 2008 @ 11:24 pm

One of the fun little promotional things I did for Infoquake was to post all the first drafts of chapter 1. You got to see the journey of the book from something I doodled on in 1997 or 1998 to the finished product that hit the shelves in July of 2006.

I’ve now gone ahead and done the same thing for MultiReal. You can now read online the first drafts of MultiReal’s chapter 1, along with footnotes and commentary about each draft. The big difference between the Infoquake drafts and the MultiReal drafts is this: for the latter book, there were thirty-five of them. Yes, thirty-five drafts of chapter 1. Told you I’m something of a perfectionist. (Keep in mind that most of these first drafts were simply rehashes of prior drafts, and most of them are incomplete.)

Instead of posting all thirty-five drafts up on my website, I’ve chosen to simply post the best or most representative samples of the eight different directions I tried. Along with the final published version, of course.

So among the abandoned concepts you can read about in these drafts are: Magan Kai Lee as ruthless martial arts expert (draft 1), a bureaucratic smackdown between rival governments about the weather (draft 17), Horvil fascinated by advertising (draft 18), and Henry Osterman trekking off to Harper’s Ferry to commit suicide (draft 29).

Quick excerpt from draft 29, my favorite abandoned version of chapter 1:

Henry Osterman was dying.

He stumbled into the provincial town of Harper on his own two feet, a pallid scarecrow of a man, his hair greasy, his clothes tattered, his fingernails curling in on themselves like shriveled worms after the rain.

Nobody could say how he had gotten there. The roads leading to Harper had been pulverized a quarter of a millennium ago by the wrath of thinking machines run amok. Tube trains and hoverbirds were technologies for a theoretical future when the world had learned to live without fossil fuels; multi and teleportation were the pipe dreams of lunatics. To get to Harper these days, you needed either a strong horse or a boat limber enough to steer through the debris clogging the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers. Osterman had neither.

The city itself was barely worth the effort. A few dozen dilapidated buildings huddled together at the bottom of a hill, that was all. The more prosperous cities nearby had pieced together a fragile shell of trade from the shards of yesterday’s civilization, but so far Harper had little to contribute. Still, you could get three radio stations again in Harper, and sometimes on clear nights you could see the feeble blink of a Chinese satellite. The local music scene was bustling. Drinking water was almost drinkable. Progress.

Hopefully this will prove useful to writers looking for some insight into the process, if not for future scholars at the Edelman Studies departments of major universities worldwide.

The Jump 225 Jumbo Mega-Bonanza Summer Giveaway (Finale)

July 29, 2008 @ 9:23 am

In the last contest of my mega-summer giveaway, I asked the all-important question that eight-year-olds have been wondering since the world was young: who would win a deathmatch smackdown, Obi-Wan Kenobi or Gandalf?

The number of entries was pretty pathetic, which makes me feel rather pathetic. I’ve been neglecting this blog terribly over the past few months, and Google Analytics reflects it.

But that doesn’t make me any less enthusiastic about awarding the final prize to loyal reader Josh Vogt. Josh writes:

I’m assuming we’re talking about the “old” Obi-wan, since it’d be great to see two hoary-haired mentor figures going head to head. Now, after they both got all frowny and had a bushy-browed staring contest, Gandalf would win the ultimate showdown (bridge locale optional). Why? Because Obi-wan has a suicidal death wish. Just stick any young Jedi-wannabe within ten feet of the old guy, and the moment anyone takes a swing at his head, whether with a staff or light saber, the dude’s going to get a mystical smile on his face, cue a little emotional background music, and let himself get decapitated into a pile of dirty laundry. Because he’s just that enigmatic. He wouldn’t dare sacrifice all that mystique for the sake of winning any kind of fight. Gandalf is much more pragmatic and at least provides substantial opposition, making sure his enemy is down for the count (preferably cast down upon the mountainside) before even letting himself take a breather.

Congratulations, Josh, you’ve won the David Louis Edelman prize pack, which includes:

• One signed copy of the Solaris mass market of Infoquake
• One signed copy of the Pyr trade paperback of MultiReal
• One signed copy of The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume Two (containing my story “Mathralon”)
• One signed copy of the new Overlook Press edition of Mervyn Peake’s Titus Alone (containing my introduction)

The only other entry of note came from Derek Johnson, who writes:

This is easy: Gandalf wins hands down.  He defeated the Balrog, and traversed the belly of Middle Earth in the process.  All Obi-Wan ever did was turn into a ghost.  Obi-Wan couldn’t even stop the chosen one from turning to the dark side of the Force.

The “how” is even easier.  Because magic in Tolkien is something of a technology, he could sap Obi-Wan of his midichlorians, which are the key elements in accessing the Force.

The topic also came up in the comments for the last contest of what would happen if you added Morpheus, Albus Dumbledore, and Duncan Idaho to the mix. Personally, I think Morpheus would kick all of their asses — because you know that the powers of all the others are simply delusions forcefed down their neural cortexes by the Matrix.