Silver Shark
I love the new world of e-publishing! One of my must-read authors, Ilona Andrews, (actually a husband & wife writing team, publishing under her name) finished writing a new book a couple of weeks ago, and got the copy-edits back a few days ago, and this morning I bought the e-book – no waiting months for the book to actually come out!
(Of course, I still have to wait for her traditionally published books to come out in the usual way, but it’s nice to get her self-pub stuff so quickly, to tide me over.)
Silver Shark is short, novella-length, I think, since I finished reading it this evening, which is another nice thing about e-publishing. You can write a story to whatever length seems right, rather than needing to hit an arbitrary word-count goal and either stretching the story out with fluff or cutting it short. The book itself is a well-written science fiction romance. 
Happily, I also wrote a bit tonight, but probably won’t do any more until tomorrow, since we have an invitation to go play Risk tonight. 
Reading and Writing
I didn’t write last night after all, though I did catch up on a bit of email, which was good.
I *did* write tonight, working on the novel rewrite, and had fun with the first action scene. I’m not quite done with it, but I did some retconning that was necessary to set it up, so I’m rather pleased.
I write because I love reading stories, and right now I’m reading one that I’ve been waiting for months for: Circle of Enemies, by Harry Connolly.
It’s AWESOME, and just as thoroughly engrossing as the previous two in this series. (The Twenty Palaces novels)
If you like a real-world setting, magic that is more scary than wonderful, and seriously novel monsters, (very Lovecraftian) then you’re likely to enjoy these books. The first one is Child of Fire, and you can read the first chapter for free.
Now, back to my book.
Book Review – Origin, by J.A. Konrath
So, I just finished reading this e-book, Origin, by J.A. Konrath. (Well, I finished it last night before I went to bed, but close enough.)
It was a fun read, well worth the $0.99 I paid for it, but definitely what I would call a popcorn novel.
The pitch, as written by the author, is:
Thriller writer J.A. Konrath, author of the Lt. Jack Daniels series, digs into the vaults and unearths a technohorror tale from the depths of hell…
1906 – Something is discovered by workers digging the Panama Canal. Something dormant. Sinister. Very much alive.
2009 – Project Samhain. A secret underground government installation begun 103 years ago in New Mexico. The best minds in the world have been recruited to study the most amazing discovery in the history of mankind. But the century of peaceful research is about to end.
BECAUSE IT JUST WOKE UP.
The thing is… even though I enjoyed it a lot, and the narrative effortlessly pulled me back in every time I picked it up after having to take a break for pesky things like work, it didn’t really satisfy. Like popcorn – fun, but not a meal. Things happen, characters survive (or don’t), but no one really changes. None of the characters are different at the end of the book than at the beginning. (Aside from death, of course.)
I don’t know if trying to add more depth would have ruined the fun of it, or pushed it to a higher level, but as it stands, I have to call it a fun read, (as long as you enjoy a little bit of blood and gore) but not a must-read.
Go, read!
Or download, at least
Resonance, by Chris Dolley is one of my favorite novels, and he’s offering it for FREE on his website as an ebook!
From the description there:
“Graham Smith is a 33 year-old office messenger. To the outside world he’s an obsessive-compulsive mute – weird but harmless. But to Graham, it’s the world that’s weird. And far from harmless.”
I love, love, love this book, and think everyone should read it.
Book Review – Draculas
I’ve been reading Joe Konrath’s blog lately, where he has some fascinating things to say about the business of publishing and self-publishing ebooks specifically. He has been a professional writer for some time, working through traditional publishers, but now releases his new books directly on Kindle for $2.99, which he argues is the optimal price-point for novels in ebook format.
My impression is that most of his books are thrillers/mysteries, which aren’t really my preferred genre, so I had never gotten around to reading any of his novels. (That’s something which seems to be happening more and more as I add new author blogs to my reading list.)
So, when he posted about his upcoming release of DRACULAS, a novel dedicated to the idea that vampires should be scary rather than angsty and sexy, I was pretty interested. Then, when he posted an offer to provide advance reading copies in exchange for reviews, I jumped at the chance.
DRACULAS, is, as I mentioned, a novel about *scary* vampires, as in twist-your-head-off-and-guzzle-your-blood scary. They’re hideous, relentless, and *hungry,* and contagious enough to spread like wildfire through your friendly neighborhood hospital. The novel is a collaboration by four authors: J.A Konrath, Blake Crouch, F. Paul Wilson and Jeff Strand. Each author follows their viewpoint characters over the few hours following the outbreak as they try to survive and to protect those dear to them.
To be honest, I started the book with low expectations – four authors I’ve never read anything by, collaborating on a self-published novel called DRACULAS? I was hoping I’d be able to make it through the book before release, (tomorrow, October 19th) but I wasn’t sure it would be good enough to honestly recommend to anyone.
Then I started reading, and didn’t want to stop.
I won’t say this was a deep novel – it wasn’t – but it was a lot of fun to read. If you like thrillers, monsters, gore and gallows humor, I think you’re likely to enjoy DRACULAS. There were places where I raced through the pages to see what happened next, others where I giggled out loud, and even a couple where I got a little teary-eyed. (True, I get teary-eyed at the drop of a hat, but still. It means I connected enough with the characters to care.) I was also pleased and surprised to find that I couldn’t tell where one author started and another left off – the book worked perfectly as a fully integrated whole.
In addition to the novel itself, which weighs in at around 60,000 words, the bonus content for the e-book includes a couple of short stories, an interview with the authors, transcripts of their email discussions while writing the book, and teaser chapters from a novel by each of the authors. If the description sounds like something you would enjoy, I can recommend this one without reservation.
© 2010 Catherine Wechsler, used with permission.
