A bad novel badly written

[chris_gerrib]

I write reviews for an online site, TCM Reviews. They pay less then peanuts for the reviews, but it's a way to get some free publicity and help promote books I like. (I also review for POD People, which specializes in self-published stuff.)

As part of my reviewer's duties, TCM Reviews sent me a SF novel to look at. No, I'm not going to name book or author because, frankly, it's embarrassingly bad. As the title of this post says, it's a bad novel badly written. Bad science, bad plot, weak characters and poor writing. Tami Brady, the owner of TCM, and I have agreed to not post a review. I'm surprised the novel got published, because the publishing house, although tiny, doesn't look like a vanity or self-pub shop.

In our discussions, Tami said something in her email that I'd like to quote. "It's kind of a double edged sword eh? Getting critiqued is the only way we grow as writers but often we don't realize that until we stick around for a while and get comfortable in our writing skin."

So, I've offered to send my comments directly and privately to the author. We'll see what happens.

Comments

[ex-emilyvei.livejournal.com]

One of the reasons I review less these days is that a small number of my reviews weren't posted and quite a few others were softened. And I would count myself pretty constructive in my opinions...

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

I sent an email to Tami saying the book was a dog before writing the review. She seems to be of the theory that for small press / self-published stuff, if it's bad don't review it. (It's not like somebody would stumble upon it.) At any rate, her site, her rules.