Crime Fiction Dossier (Old)

Deciding what to review

How do you decide what to read/review?

This question comes up a lot (in fact, it could be an Ask the Critic entry), so I answered it for M.J. Rose's excellent blog, Buzz, Balls & Hype:

Deciding which book to review, or even which book to read next, is one of the hardest parts of a critic's job. I receive somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 books every month. I try to read 12-15 and review 6 or 7.

On rare occasions, the selection is made for me, as when I'm reviewing something on assignment or writing a piece on someone and need to read their book first. Usually, though, the decision is up to me, and it's a tough one to make. I want to read as many different types of books (all within the crime fiction genre) as I can, and don't want to miss anything important, but I also want to be entertained.

The choice can be daunting, given the sheer numbers involved. Due to the constant inundation of books, I often feel overwhelmed with the possibilities. (I have read that many shoppers feel the same way when walking into bookstores. I sympathize.) Forget reading for pleasure; I'm just trying to make a small dent in the huge stacks that line the walls of my office.

On a good day, the choice is obvious. If a new book by someone whose work I love (like Laura Lippman, Barry Eisler or Robert Ferrigno, for example) comes in, I will usually read it as soon as I can. I'm not very good at delaying gratification. (Christmas mornings were always a bitch for me.)

Most of the time, though, it's harder than that.

Continue reading "David Montgomery on What to Review" over at Buzz, Balls & Hype.

You too can write for free!

If you've ever wanted to join the big-time world of non-paid book reviewing, now’s your chance!

I’m looking for another reviewer to join the staff of Mystery Ink, the book review and author interview site that I run.

I haven’t been able to update the site as much as I’d like over the past year or two, but I’m hoping to change that in the future.

If you’re interested in possibly contributing, please send me a few of your reviews, or links to where I can read them. (It’s okay if you’ve never reviewed before, assuming you have talent.)

I have a preference for reviews that are around 400 words, are a reasonable mixture of summary and analysis, and are journalistic rather than personal. (Hint: the review is about the book; not about you.) I don’t like long quotes from the text or lots of “I, I, I.”

Ideally, I’m looking for someone who is strong on the cozier end of the genre, although a love of books and the ability to write about them intelligently is paramount.

Requirements: You should be willing to write one or two reviews per month. You should be reasonably tech-savvy so that you can post your reviews to the site, using TypePad’s interface (it’s easy). You should be passionate about reading and writing and willing to take advice.

What do you get out of it? No money. Did I mention that yet? You will, however, get a few free books, the chance to help decide the Gumshoe Awards, and the opportunity to be read by tens of people!

I look forward to hearing from you.

The elephant graveyard of books

I review somewhere between 5 and 10 books most months. I get a lot more than that, though. Here is what I got over the past 2 months or so that I decided not to read for one reason or another.

(I have a slightly smaller set that I received over the same period of time that I hope to read, even if I can't review them.)

So in response to the question, "Why didn't you review such-and-such a book?" here is the answer.

Post apologies for John Irving review

The Associated Press reports today that the Washington Post has apologized for a negative review of John Irving's new novel that they ran last month:

Irving's Until I Find You, an 824-page novel based partly on the author's relationship with his father, was panned in a July 10 review by Marianne Wiggins as a "mass of lazy, unrefined writing."

Wiggins, herself a novelist and National Book Award finalist, also declared that "The story reads as if Irving woke from a recurring nightmare and started dictating compulsively."

Wiggins wasn't the only reviewer to dislike Irving's book, but she was likely the only one once married to author Salman Rushdie, a longtime friend of Irving's. Noting that he had a personal relationship with Wiggins, Irving complained to the Post, which requires critics to sign agreements that "any contact, friendly or otherwise, with the author of this book" should be disclosed to the paper.

In an "Editor's Note" published Sunday, the Post stated: "Had we known that Irving had dedicated one of his earlier novels (A Son of the Circus) to Marianne Wiggins' ex-husband, Salman Rushdie, and had we known that Irving and Wiggins had socialized with each other in the past, we would not have made the assignment.

"We apologize to our readers for this misstep."

Having written for the Post, I remember that contract they make you sign. (They're the only newspaper that has required me to do that.)

It definitely raises a few eyebrows to have a novelist review a book from a good friend of her ex-husband, most importantly because she apparently didn't disclose that to her editor. (I'm a little surprised, though, that they didn't know already. These are hardly unknown people in question here.)

Now if they'd just apologize for another hatchet job they published: the "review" of George Pelecanos' last book by Maya Angelou's son.

Joe Queenan on The Hillary Book

Joe Queenan, the "Look how funny I am, ma!" non-book-reviewer, has finally found a book that is deserving of his attention: Edward Klein's The Truth About Hillary.

To suggest, as the talented John Podhoretz did in The New York Post, that this is "one of the most sordid volumes I have ever waded through" is to raise serious questions about Podhoretz's sordid wading experiences.

As an expert on sordid nonfiction, I would not put The Truth About Hillary anywhere near the top of my list; it pales by comparison with Geraldo Rivera's sublimely vile autobiography, Exposing Myself, and seems demure, nuanced and levelheaded by comparison with masterpieces of partisan venom like the 60's cold-war classic None Dare Call It Treason.

No, I am not suggesting that Edward Klein is a fair, balanced, persuasive, scrupulously honest reporter or a gifted writer. Resorting to chilling Rip Van Winklisms like "Bill and Hillary often grooved the night away at Cozy Beach, spinning the latest Jefferson Airplane platters," Klein sometimes sounds like a cryogenically preserved Maynard G. Krebs. Like, dig: the cat is far out.

What I am saying is that if Klein purposely set out to write the sleaziest, most derivative, most despicable political biography ever, he has failed both himself and his readers miserably. The Truth About Hillary is only about the 16th sleaziest book I have ever read. Though, in fairness to the author, reading creepy, cut-and-paste books is my hobby.

Granted, it's a waste of time (and previous review space) for the New York Times to have someone like Queenan cover a book that is so obviously a huge, stinking pile. But at least this time he was funny. (Thanks to Sarah for the tip.)

Reviewer Poll: Authors contacting critics

As regular readers of this blog will know, one of the things I do here on the Crime Fiction Dossier is talk about the world of the book critic, and try to shed some light on the process of book reviewing.

Last week I wrote about “How books get chosen for review,” specifying how the last several books I reviewed had gotten into my hands. Author Bob Morris then brought up an interesting point in the comments section:

I'm not quite sure how, or even if, I should approach reviewers. Some book critics I know have told me that it is bad form for a writer to contact a potential reviewer and that to do so will actually work against you. Rather, they say, we should rely on our publicists to get the books to the reviewers and hope for the best.

I always tell authors that it’s okay, that they should notify reviewers when they have a book coming out. (There are so damn many book published that it’s impossible to keep up with everything, so this can be helpful to critics.)

That advice is fine if writers want to approach me. But what about other critics? How do they feel about being contacted by authors? That, I did not know.

So, at this week’s meeting of the Super Secret Book Critic Cabal, where we all get together to decide which books we’re going to praise, which to pan, and which to make bestsellers, I asked.

Suggestions, please?

If you have any suggestions for what I should read and review in the next week, please send 'em along. I'm having a helluva time finding stuff. The summer doldrums are upon me.

Thanks.

Anonymous reviews

Author Quinn Dalton has an intriguing piece over at Media Bistro about the flogging her new short story collection, Bulletproof Girl, received by Kirkus:

The unbylined review deemed my writing "pat," my stories "flat" and the collection as a whole trivial for dealing with "overly familiar domestic issues." (I guess I should've seen that coming: Stories by women about women are by nature domestic, and therefore overly familiar; one might as well put the kitchen sink on the cover.)

Negative reviews are part of the territory, of course, but what has Dalton upset in this case is the anonymous nature of Kirkus' reviews:

There are some good arguments to be made for trade publications reviewing books anonymously. Nobody wants to read a review that is a thinly-veiled tool for self-advancement or a little back-slapping between friends. But anonymity causes as many problems as it solves, and I think reviewers—at least the professionals—should cut it out.

She goes on to write that:

...anonymity doesn't remove personal bias on the part of the reviewer—for or against certain authors, or certain types of books. It just cloaks bias behind a brand name, and is therefore untraceable for librarians and booksellers and the authors whose careers suffer or are nurtured as a result.

That seems like a rather sound argument to me. Dalton is right: anonymity is just as likely to hide bias as it is to remove it.

How to get your book reviewed - an ongoing series

I've been planning a comprehensive discussion on the subject of "How to get your book reviewed." I'm too busy right now, unfortunately, to sit down and actually write up what I have in mind, though. (Guyot is snapping at my heels and my boss keeps almost catching me writing reviews when I'm supposed to be working.)

I thought I could offer some tips, though, in the meantime. Here's the first one:

Address your letter/email to the correct person.

I wrote last week about how I feel when I get emails addressed simply to "Mystery Ink." Recently, I got a book in the mail and an accompanying letter addressed to "Vince Darcangelo, Boulder Weekly."

As the old saying goes, you only get one chance to make a first impression, and that made a poor one on me. We all make mistakes -- I've made similar ones myself -- but that is a time at which it's especially important that everything go right.

That didn't kill the book outright for me, but it sure didn't help. The book was from a publisher I'd never heard of, by an unknown author. I was already a little skeptical of the book's chances for being any good, and this just added to the amateur factor.

So for those of you who are thinking of submitting a book to a reviewer, or even just making a query, spend the time to find out the person's name and then correctly address your correspondence. Even if you're not a professional, you can act like one and nobody will be the wiser.

Another lesson in how not to promote your book

I got an email today from a hopeful new writer asking me to review his new book:

Dear Mystery Ink:

I am an attorney on the eve of launching [a new series of novels], which are hard-edged legal/crime thrillers. I would love to get a review from you for the first novel in this series...Chapter One is available on-line at [omitted] and we would be happy to mail you the entire book (galleys) upon request or e-mail additional chapters for your review.

I thoroughly believe that you will find this book compelling and that your readers will be very interested in it.

He went on to include some product details, plus a long list of "representative blurbs received from notable authors," all of them unsigned.

Finally, he closed by promising:

If you could provide a review by June 30, 2005, we would be in a position to excerpt it for the cover and/or elsewhere in the book, which would be good advertising for your review site and also the indiviudal [sic] reviewer who would be named.

For all I know, the book is wonderful. This pitch, though, is misguided on several accounts.