In the long, long discussion of the fallout from the John Locke debacle, I noted that getting reviews on your work is an agonizing process—that I have books that have sold thousands of copies and have obtained only one or two reviews.
The publishing industry has been giving ARCs to reviewers since there’s been a publishing industry. Official reviewers however, almost all refuse self-published books, and almost all refuse ebooks, and since I’m self-publishing now, and the format I can afford to send out is PDF, I can forget about official reviewers.
At which point, one of my readers suggested that if I wanted to get legitimate reviews of my books posted to places like Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble, and Apple, I ought to create ARCs (the publishing acronym for advance reading copies) and give copies to some of my fans and readers, and let them review the books.
My fans who were quick on the trigger would get free copies, they would not be required to write reviews (though if you do, it will help me out, and anything that helps sales makes it easier for me to pay the bills while writing the next one). And there would be no question of buying reviews, creating fake identities to write their own reviews, or any other sleazy practices some folks are engaging in.
So I’m going to try this out for both Hunting the Corrigan’s Blood and Warpaint.
I’ll send out PDF copies of Hunting the Corrigan’s Blood TODAY to the first twenty-five of my readers who state they’d like to act as book reviewers. Book reviewers don’t review every book they receive, and you will not be required to review this one.
If you spot typos, send them to me as soon as you spot them, and I’ll fix them in any version that is not yet in print.
I’ll email all reviewers for this this book, first to send your your ARC, and then to send you the links to the book page on the various sites when it goes live. If you want a little copy of the book cover so you can also post the review on your weblog (if you have one) let me know and I’ll send one along.
SO… if you want to read the book for review, reply to this post. (I’m NOT CHECKING EMAIL, so don’t email a request). make sure you include your email address in the e-mail address box when reply (it won’t show up on the site) and make sure it doesn’t include typos, or your book won’t arrive.
And thank you for taking the time to consider reviewing Hunting the Corrigan’s Blood.
Important Note for Selected Reviewers
I send the first eight copies via direct email. I THEN notices that the PDF is 13.9 MB.
So if you didn’t get your copy, Please just reply to your FIRST reply, and I’ll resend via YouSendIt, which gives you a link from which you can download your PDF. I apologize for any inconvenience.
I’m sending the REST of the copies by YouSendIt. Reviewers—you’ll need to click a link in the email to download your PDF, but that’s it.
I’ve now sent out all 25 personalized ARC copies to my Official Reader/Review Team #1 :D.
HUGE thanks to everyone who offered to do this.
If you didn’t post quickly enough to make the first 25 this time, there are almost certainly going to be openings for reviewers next month when WARPAINT, the second Cadence Drake Novel, comes out. Folks who who read and reviewed HTCB will get automatic first consideration, but I anticipate openings left by readers who didn’t have time to read HTCB, didn’t have time to review it, and so on.
So if you hoped to be added to the review list, watch your email next month when I ask for additional reviewers for WARPAINT.
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