In last month’s blog, I mentioned that I had e-mailed well-known science fiction and fantasy author, Piers Anthony, to thank him for a letter he sent me nearly 30 years ago and to request his address to send him a copy of my debut novel Shadow Dragon.

I am pleased to say that not only did he send me his address, but he also offered to read the book and give me an honest comment.  Needless to say, I quickly shipped it off and then began to check my e-mail every day, anxiously awaiting a reply from him.  I was rewarded just a couple of days later when he e-mailed me to inform me that he had received the book and that it looked interesting.  I was very grateful that he was courteous enough to let me know he had received the book, and then I began the waiting process again, anxiously waiting to hear back from him, but also afraid of the possibility that he would inform me that it just wasn’t any good.  You see, over that last several years I had become used to rejection as I continued to send the book out to numerous agents, only to get rejected time and time again.  One of the most frustrating responses I got was when I let the agents know the word count of the book, which is approximately 128,000 words, was that the book was just too long; publishers would never publish anything that long from a first time novelist and I would have to cut that down to about 80,000 words.  And that was before they had even read it!  Responses like that are what finally led me to the decision to self-publish the book through iUniverse.

So on Saturday morning, a little more than a week later, when I checked my e-mail and found a response from Piers Anthony I nervously opened it, expecting to hear the worst.  And this is what I found: (Warning, the review contains spoilers)

Here is a copy of the review of SHADOW DRAGON I will include in my

Jewel-Lye 2012 HiPiers column. I did enjoy the novel.

    I read Shadow Dragon, by Lance Horton. This is a science fiction horror

thriller self published at iUniverse, and is another example of the

inadequacy of Parnassus, the traditional publishing establishment. Because

this is a fully worthy novel. The author couldn’t get an agent? Couldn’t get

a publisher? No wonder sales are declining! The author wrote to me thirty

years ago, and I described the closed shop that traditional publishing tends

to be, designed more to keep newcomers out than to locate and promote the

best fiction. As old-timer Robert Moore Williams told me maybe 40 years ago,

the fat hogs have their snouts in the trough and they’re not about to let

any piglets get any swill. Nothing much has changed in the interim, except

for this: the advent of electronic publishing and affordable self publishing

is bypassing the limited trough and letting everyone else in. There are

those who hate that, but I am convinced that this is good for publishing,

because the readers want the best, not the best that’s on paid-for shelves

by fat hogs. With the Internet a reader can find just about anything,

ranging from abysmal to excellent, and this is a novel that needs finding.

The author says that the monster herein was inspired in part by my mantas in

Omnivore, and I can see bits of that inspiration, but that’s not the reason

I like this novel. It’s that it is well crafted, well developed, and

supremely compelling. Kyle is investigating multiple savage homicides in the

Montana backwoods. Carrie goes there because her beloved grandparents are

two of the victims. Neither is satisfied with the official explanations, and

indeed it turns out that the monsters of the forest are complemented by the

corporate monsters of the boardrooms, who are as ruthless in covering up

their awful errors as the monsters are in shedding blood. It seems that a

corporate plane crashed and something got loose, and innocent residents are

paying the price. By the time our protagonists come to grips with the deadly

forest monster, the corporate killer is on their trail. It’s a nice

interweaving of the elements, with a hint of romance. If you want a story

that will keep you nervous until the end, this is the one. It’s slightly out

of my genre, as I’m more into humorous fantasy, but this one held my

attention throughout.

He then pointed out a couple of typo’s and a grammatical error in the book, which I intend to fix in future editions, and then he finished it off with this:

But these are warts on Miss Universe. It’s a fine novel.

Needless to say, I was ecstatic. I don’t think I have come down from my high yet.

You can find the review of my book along with his review of the movie Prometheus on Piers Anthony’s Website at: http://hipiers.com/12july.html