Tuesday, September 29, 2020

Validation


I always sweat a bit about reviews, and when Crossroad Press said they'd be sending a review copy of Fool's Run to Publisher's Weekly, I perspired a bit more. It's a natural move, but you never know what's going to be said.  

READ THE PW REVIEW

A friend who's also a publisher told me not to worry. Bad reviews can still mean sales and discovery by new readers. What a critic didn't like might be what a reader of the review is looking for. 

Brutal opening in a horror tale? Sign me up!

I guess all the sweating made the positive review all the more meaningful. 

Writing a novel is a bit like putting a puzzle together, and it's also about decisions and judgment. 

Once upon a time, I didn't think I had anything new to offer the detective novel. I wrote three trunk private eye novels starting in college and just after I started as a reporter. 

They primed me for writing the first novel that sold, Azarius, but I didn't feel I had anything new to offer the private eye tale. I put my Benjamin Ross stories away and moved on.

ADD FOOL'S RUN ON GOODREADS

I returned to the form while teaching a mystery writing class and studying and codifying the mystery in its various forms for students. 

Si Reardon, hero of Fool's Run, took shape as a flawed former police officer on a dark mission. I didn't want him to simply go from one interview to another and piece a puzzle together.  I hoped to juggle the tropes of the mystery form a bit and swirl something a little different.

The reviewer from Publisher's Weekly seemed to get that. Someone will come along who doesn't love it, but so it goes. 

Pre-order the novel 


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