Amanda Hocking; "Switched", "Torn, "Ascend"

In these three little novels, trolls exist (and we’re not talking the kind of troll you find on the internet trawling for attention…), they can pass for human except for their unique powers, and they are still switching out their babies for human ones as changelings where they are raised by rich families. The trolls are using humanity to sustain themselves. The troll changelings come of age and return to the Troll communities to bring their hefty inheritances home to fund the Troll communities that await them.

Wendy is such a changeling. She was raised by a mother that actually tried to kill her because she knew Wendy wasn’t hers. Sometime after her mother is placed in a mental institution and she becomes her aunt’s ward along with her brother, Wendy is astonished to discover she has a real mother who also happens to be Queen of the Troll ‘Trylle’ enclave. She discovers in book 1, that she is a princess and she has her own Tracker (protectors and servants of sort) named Finn with whom she finds herself enamoured., She also meets a human boy who turns out to be the foster-family’s child with whom she was switched. She also discovers that her new community over which she may reign someday is practicing traditions she’s ashamed of—and that she’s being hunted by another group of trolls from a different enclave known as the Vittra.

Wendy walks out of a difficult childhood into a confusing life with a mother who is cold and demanding, a future that is daunting and fraught with danger, and a bleak prospect for romance considering that trackers are untouchables to the royalty class.

These books are fun. I devoured them. I bought them with little hope for them being anything decent, but I was surprised. There is the taste of youth in the books, but they are not hideously written, and the writer has acquired the skill of drawing her readers in and keeping their attention. She does repeat phrases again and again sometimes, but her manuscripts are very well edited and clean, which is always a relief whenever I pick up an indie book. Thank you, Miss Hocking for being thoughtful and considerate to your readers.

The covers are wonderful in their simplicity and artfulness. I think they’re beautiful, and they don’t scream self-published like many others do. After a little poking about, it looks like Miss Hocking has a really great tact for being a prolific writer, for producing professional books, and for marketing herself nicely. She is actively managing a blog and website. It’s quite impressive, and I think a lot of indie authors could learn from what this young woman is doing. I think this girl has a strong chance of attracting attention from a traditional publisher.

There are some things about the books that do bother me, but that's likely because I'm not fourteen. The author's skill for description needs work, but that will come with more experience. These books read as very simple... the writing is basic. The stories are really fun and original... but these are definitely books for tweens and teens.

I give these books all a good, solid 4 medallions each -- I feel inclined to give one of them less than that, but I am rating them as a package. So 4 it is.

Lauren Burd; "Immortal"

The gift of a B&N Nook has been both a gift and a bane, because I find myself reading fifty times more than I used to; and my free time is already so limited. ::sigh:: I also tend to browse the nookbooks and buy whatever suits my fancy, since the nookbooks are so cheap and so easy to breeze through.

Immortal is one of four books I’ve read by independent authors that I’ve decided to do non-queried reviews on. The next three books will be done in one post because they are all three in one series. I already had an idea that Immortal would be very closely aligned to the Twilight saga. The story reflected much of Bella’s story.

* Pale, seemingly complicated heroine who has no idea how incredibly beautiful and attractive she really is, and thinks herself quite ordinary and plain against her friends [check]

* Parental relationship problems [check]

* Irresistible to supernatural creatures. [check]

* Misunderstanding and lack of communication. [check]

* Rivals fighting over her (what girl in her late teens and early twenties doesn't fantasize about that?). [check]

* Sudden threat appears in middle of book. [check]

There are some efforts to make this story its own ‘being’ so to speak, to separate itself from the collection of what is essentially Twilight fan-fic flooding the nookbook and kindle lists. It’s a tolerable story that I was compelled to read, so it shows that the author knows how to tell a story… and she knows how to draw in a reader. As independent books go, it's really readable. Like the three books to follow this review, I devoured it. That’s good, especially coming from me, considering that if a book doesn’t draw me in by the first few pages, I’ll huck it aside and forget about it. I’ll sometimes grudgingly drag myself through some particularly bad books, but rarely. If I already feel like I’m going to rip it to shreds with a scathing review, I’ll forget about it.

But what Miss Hurd has done that does make me bristle, is that she published something that was not polished or ready for publication. And this is my usual gripe about independent books… Authors… GET AN EDITOR! God damn it! It can take a good book and bring it down to nothing if you don’t have it polished. I don’t care what you do, take it to an old professor, do SOMETHING, but have it proofread. I simply despise reading along and coming along a ridiculous error that immediately ruins the experience. The flow of the writing is instantly marred when I come across typos, bad grammar (this is really irritating to me… the use of apostrophes is really not so complex as it cannot be learned), misused words, overly-repeated phrases and descriptions, and inconsistencies. It is my biggest pet peeve and it should be one of the primary considerations before anyone decides to hit that ‘submit’ button on PubIt!.

As for the story… well, I think the author needs to work a bit harder on adding a smidge more sophistication to her work, but I really cannot find too much fault with her writing in general. Sure she repeats a lot, sure it’s simplistic, as is most YA material… but it can be simple and still have a tiny shred of maturity to it. Also she should go back and secure the services of a good, experienced editor… and she should work harder to try to keep her story original. I imagine if Miss Burd was writing something that wasn’t based on the standard framework of the vampire teeny-angsty book, her writing style with some originality could really take her places.

I also am feeling a bit cheated. Miss Burd showed some promise at the beginning of her book, hinting at a complex relationship between Alina and her mother. It was the sort of thing I hoped the whole thing would be framed around… her choices, her reactions, her behaviours, influenced by her mother’s abandonment of her. But I was very disappointed. She never expanded upon it once she hinted at it. I wanted to know why they were not getting along—and how that affected Alina’s choices. It's like as soon as Alina left she completely forgot about her except to mention her a bit during one conversation. It was not explained at all, and I think it would have added some serious depth to what is a fluffy story otherwise. Her relationship with her father also… very vague.

I know it’s hard to juggle a lot of characters… and that’s something all independent and new authors have to think about. If you connect people with too many relationships, it’s impossible to carry them all through the story. You have to just drop people, and keep the story going, and leave the reader wondering what the hell happened to them. You should not invest your readers in someone, and then just forget about them.

This could be an excellent story if she took it down from web-sale, and sat down on a nice, warm weekend, and started padding out some of the bones of the story, adding some complexity to her characters, giving them depth and motivations, and raising it a level from the rest of the chaff. She could also work on padding out the brief encounters with the hero, so that the love that they feel for one another is actually based on more than a few chance encounters and chemistry (which the heroine seems to share with more than one fellow through the story) She could really do it too, because her writing is actually quite good.

This is why I’m not going to give the book a bad rating. It isn’t a bad book… it just needs more work. Four medallions.

Wil Wheaton; "Dancing Barefoot"

Since I have been bereft of queries to draw my interest, I decided to read Dancing Barefoot, a book written by Wil Wheaton; the young man who played Wesley in Star Trek the Next Generation. It was given to me by one of my prior-reviewed authors who’s become a good friend. She follows a lot of the geeky stuff on the web, because that’s what she does, and she brought me this small book when I complained about having nothing good to read.

I was dubious, to say the least. One, because it’s not the first time I’ve picked up a book by a celebrity. Many times I’ve been often disappointed by the product; most of which are usually ghost-written testaments to their amazingness, or a ‘woe-is-me, look what I’ve overcome to become the awesomeness I am today’ sort of diatribe. But what encouraged me to go ahead and read it was how thin the book was; I figured I’d have to suffer only a little.

I was astonished, to be honest. I was surprised by the honesty in the tone and the level to which Mr. Wheaton was willing to open up about his insecurities, his vulnerability and his humanity—all in a very short book. What a great guy. That’s what I came away thinking after devouring the 115 pages of font size 14 text in two hours. I have decided to post a quick review of the book on Odyssey because Wil is an independent author who published his own work, and so a review of his work is not out of place here. FYI: Wil apparently has a few more books on offer, which I now plan to purchase and enjoy.

Dancing Barefoot is a collection of five stories from Wil’s life. The stories include memories of his young life, starting with memories of a beloved aunt; which is an incredibly raw and touching piece, written in such a superb, heartfelt voice; and ending in a lengthy missive about a Star Trek convention, where he makes you laugh and then mists you up in the span of a few paragraphs.

Wil has a natural writing style that is incredibly readable and filled with warmth and vulnerability. There’s no pretence, no airs, it’s him in his most human state, including even his cutting sarcasm and unique perspective growing up on the set of a Sci-Fi show. His descriptions are excellent, and his wit and humour is wonderful. I’m now a fan. I recommend this book to anyone; trekkers or non-trekker alike. It’s a realistic glimpse into how difficult it can be to grow up in the public eye, and how hard the approval and disapproval of the famous and the fan alike can be life-changing.

Read this book. It’s great. Five medallions.

Yes, we are still alive. But barely.

This is what I am doing when I am trying to keep sane.

Yes, it’s been forever since we’ve posted a review here on Odyssey. It doesn’t mean the site is inactive, it just means life has gotten rough for both me and the people who were kind enough to supply reviews. Seeing how the economy has been, adding to additional stressors and things you cannot control, it’s not surprising we haven’t had reviews in a while. Personally, I am hoping, after this year’s loss of my father, the subsequent illness of my mother and my assuming guardianship of my developmentally disabled adult brother, that things will settle down for me in this coming year enough so that I can focus on things like reading and recruiting new reviewers. Suffice it to say, I haven’t taken time to read a lot of mainstream books, let alone Indie review books lately. I barely have time to ride my cinnamon tank pictured above.

Please note that I am still receiving queries, many of which do not meet our already fairly strict criteria. A lot of authors are using promotional companies to do all the review requests, and it’s gotten so annoying that I’ve started deleting anything coming from certain promoters, because they blatantly send out blanket emails with our address amid a dozen others without regard to what we requested. So sorry, authors, but if you are relying on a promoter to get reviews for you, and they are contacting Odyssey, it’s likely I won’t even look at the query honestly. Their bulk emails are becoming seriously annoying to someone whose stress levels have been already pushed beyond capacity—I got tired of replying: ‘we are sorry, but this book does not meet our review criteria’ over and over again—so I’ve taken to just dismissing them as they come.

I may sound grumpy, but many reviewers can become so, it’s demanding for a voluntary task, and many times, it’s overwhelming and thankless. Most of the time, authors are never quite ready to hear the truth about their work or they think they’re special and deserve more attention than other authors. I’ve even had authors request that we change a review because it wasn’t what they expected it to be. Reviewing is hard work. We have all striven to provide honest reviews, and have been kind to those whose books were downright terrible and spared posting the harsh opinion.

I am now going to send out a tentative call for books to review. I am alone, and have little time, but I can do some reading each night before bed, and I want to read things that I like, Fantasy and Sci-Fi, and maybe the occasional mystery. I want to read something that is clean and edited… I don’t want to be distracted by hellacious typos and bad formatting. I want something that will make me smile, and make me look forward to more work from that author, like our 5-medallion books.

So if you truly believe your POD, Indie book meets the above criteria, please send a query as outlined on our submissions page, and please be patient with me if I do not review quickly.

If you’ve sent us a book already and it did not get reviewed, I apologize. It was for one or more reasons: 1) the reviewer flaked out on me (many do) and did not return the book to pass onto another reviewer or myself, or 2) the book was awful and we didn’t have the heart to tell you that’s why we didn’t post a review.

I intend to start afresh and start slowly. I am seeking new RELIABLE reviewers to assist me in the task, so if you think you can do this (it’s hard work, I am warning you) then please do feel free to petition me, I would be grateful for the help and infinitely less grumpy about the whole process. I will invite new reviewers to be contributors to this blog page, and they will be able to post their reviews freely, along with other articles and discussions as they please (as long as it’s not awful). :)

Have a lovely thanksgiving. Looking forward to new queries … I will sort through some of my old ones that I haven’t lost or deleted to see if there are any early contenders for review during the holidays; if possible.