Reviews!

Is my name big and gold enough?

So, today The Sky Woman is officially released. Hooray! It’s been a long wait. Many thanks are due to everyone who helped make this book happen: my wife Kia, my daughter, my parents (especially my mom who did a careful read of an early draft), my other friends who read various versions (Jason W. and Jason K. — looking at you guys), my friends who have encouraged me unconditionally along the way (especially my music brothers Spesh and Mark), and many readers of this blog who have cheered me on. And also editor Don D’Auria, and all the folks at Flame Tree Press who worked hard to get the book out today (in multiple formats, all beautifully done). I deeply appreciate all of you.

And … the reviews are starting to trickle in. Not as many as I would like at this point but that’s partly on me — as a newbie author I didn’t put as much time into the “Who would you like this book reviewed by?” section of my author questionnaire as I should have. After the fact I forwarded about a dozen more requests to have advance review copies sent to various reviewers and publications, and Flame Tree has been great about fulfilling those requests, but I should have had that list together much earlier.

Still, I’m beginning to see the reactions of readers who are not my friends and family, who may or may not understand my speculative visions of possible futures, who may or may not like my way of thinking, or my personality and attitudes as they are reflected in my writing. Some early reviews are extremely encouraging, such as this one (Pamela Morris Books) and this one (Whiskey With My Book). Others are baffling, such as this one (not actually for The Sky Woman but for my recent novelette The Icelandic Cure).

Yes, like many science fiction books, The Icelandic Cure is set in the future. But I suppose that review might be useful for someone — I can’t really get too upset about it.

Some of the criticisms I’ve seen of The Sky Woman are understandable, such as:

• It’s kind of marketed as having a romantic angle (with the subtitle) but it doesn’t really. That’s fair. I didn’t want a subtitle but that was one of the few things Flame Tree overruled me on (they gave me everything else I wanted, including a map and the inclusion of my insane footnotes). The Sky Woman does have a love story (Car-En becomes romantically involved with Esper) but in terms of the romance genre, no. The relationship just isn’t portrayed that way.
• It’s complicated and information dense. True. There are actually four essays in the novel that are pure expository info-dumps. There are also a couple of footnotes that are unreasonably long and detailed. But some readers loved those elements, so I kept them in.

Mostly, at this point, I need more reviews. So if you read and even remotely enjoy The Sky Woman, please leave a review on amazon or goodreads. They don’t have to be long or detailed. If you have criticisms, feel free to include them — reviews are feedback and all feedback is useful for course corrections. However if you just don’t like books about the future, maybe find another book?

So once again, thank you everybody! It’s an exciting thing to actually become a novelist after all these years of writing alone in a room, and it has definitely been a team effort.

Posts in the pipeline:

• The Sky Woman review contest, with awesome prizes (reviews written before the contest starts will count, so please don’t wait to post)
• Patreon launch (patron benefits will include exclusive access to fiction drafts and private blog posts)
• Supplement update (which nutritional supplements I’m currently taking, and why)

Events

Bay Area residents — please join me at East Bay Booksellers on College Ave. in Oakland (previously Diesel Books) this Wednesday Sep. 12th at 7pm for the launch party for The Sky Woman. I’ll be reading some short excerpts and serving up wine and desserts. If you’re on Facebook you can RSVP here. Hope to see you there!