Sci-Fi, fantasy and speculative Indie Authors Review discussion

Genre: Science Fiction

Amazon page with the Look Inside:
http://www.amazon.com/Double-Life-Raz...

Anyone want to poke at this one? ;)

Per the rules, I can't,but if we don't start seeing thumbs by midweek I will make an exception.

Christina wrote: "Per the rules, I can't,but if we don't start seeing thumbs by midweek I will make an exception."

If not, no worries, but I thought I'd bump it just to see :)

VOTE: Thumbs up, with caveats.

OVERALL NOTE: I may have gotten some things wrong. I went through this quickly, as I would when shopping for a new author.

COVER: Meh. Nothing bad about it but it conveys none of the playfulness or attitude - and only shows half her life! Maybe brighten some of the stars to suggest the silhouette of a pirate's ship ... or an eyepatch...?

BLURB: The first line is terrific, and won my thumbs up all on its own. The rest needs work. In fact, if I came upon this blurb out in the world, I would not proceed to excerpt because the blurb would have given me the (wrong) expectation that the book's writing would lack clarity.
The info is disjointed and the blurb needs to be shorter or longer, to eliminate or elaborate on the current level of details. Here are places where I got distracted or confused:
+Piracy is a game? Cool! But... boo! no hint of this in the rest of the blurb...
+ "At least, she would be" Would be what? The construction doesn't follow from the previous sentence.
+ "bank transactions" too much detail and sounds boring. "by her considerable wits" is enough - and more interesting.
+ "just enough to stay out of trouble" What kind of trouble?
+ "father's mysterious research" - is that the star counting and selling?
+ why is her boss slimy? is the boss a family member? is that why the brother is at work?
+ Does she intend to keep her pirate life hidden forever, or only until she can get off probation and make some real money?
+ why does it matter that the intern is mistaken for a hostage? Because it will reveal her secret life?

EXCERPT: I got restless during the prologue (too much too soon on the "world building" info) but enjoyed discovering earthbound family dynamics in such an exotic setting. I liked the graphics in the first chapter, although once I start seeing some images, I expect to see them throughout, which made me go back and wonder why there were no images in the prologue. But these are hair-splitter comments. The excerpt did its job - it made me want to read more.

Sue wrote: "VOTE: Thumbs up, with caveats.

OVERALL NOTE: I may have gotten some things wrong. I went through this quickly, as I would when shopping for a new author.

COVER: Meh. Nothing bad about it but it c..."

Sue - Thanks for your comments!

Thumbs down.

Cover: underwhelmed - it isn't bad, I just thought it a bit bland (although I do like the title font and would change the author name to match).

Blurb: it's probably just me, but on first reading I thought she had become a pirate; on rereading it, a bounty hunter who tracks down pirates; on third reading I realised it was both... Also, the sentence 'At least, she would be...' doesn't follow from the previous sentence, and the last line sounds (to me) a bit odd too.

Excerpt: right from the start, in the Prologue, there are sentences I didn't understand - 'Giant boulders...tall' for example. The sentence after that could do with losing the final 'here'. Then there's 'a thin silvery curtain...wind' (?); 'charged with exploring undiscovered planets' (exploring what?); and 'Her father had said...equipment' ('cause' should be 'caused' I think). There are some punctuation errors too (mostly commas).

There's more in Chapter 1, for instance: 'This could put a damper in her sale' (should be 'on' ?) and 'The ship turned upwards and headed towards the atmosphere of the planet'(?!?) On the other hand, there are those boxes of info (I like that sort of thing, and some of the names are wonderful!)

Overall, I've mixed feelings about this one: the prose seemed (to me anyway) to relax and improve as it went along and I was quite intrigued to see where it was going; I'm giving it the thumbs down, though, because I think it does need a good edit.

Richard wrote: "Thumbs down.

Cover: underwhelmed - it isn't bad, I just thought it a bit bland (although I do like the title font and would change the author name to match).

Blurb: it's probably just me, but on ..."

Richard - Thanks for the thoughts. Appreciate you giving it a look even if you gave it a thumbs down! Was feeling a little lonely over here... :P

Finally getting a chance to do a little more with the project. (RL has been kicking my backside all over the place, and with school starting again, I may wind up having to vanish once more as the homework piles up.)

Cover: A bit obscure to me. Once you start reading the sample, the image makes sense, but as something to give a hint about the story, it fails to do so. Once you've gotten into the sample, it makes beautiful sense.

Blurb: Would definitely draw me in. It's fun, captures the tone of the sample wonderfully, and leaves enough questions in my mind to have me gleefully diving into the body of the book to find answers.

Sample: A few awkward sentences, but nothing that jarred me out of the flow of the story. Well written, and well twined double story line winding through the sample.

Verdict: Cautious thumbs up. A little tweaking on the cover, and I'd say you have a solid winner here.

Okay, I have already read and rated this one, but since we have stalled, I'm adding my appraisal.
Thumbs up
Cover: I like the simplicity. I also like the purple, which stands out because it isn't a typical color in today's blue and orange sci-fi landscape.

Blurb: Reads well to me, except that I agree with both Richard and Sue regarding 'At least she would be...'

Excerpt: I read the whole book in basically one sitting, so clearly, it drew me in.

Read, and have 2 of my 3 reviews up. Still have to track down Goodreads, but here ya go for Amazon and my blog:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R2WD7OTO...

https://pukahworks.wordpress.com/2015...

Will probably be tomorrow or Friday before I can get the Goodreads review up. Will edit this when I do.

Had a blast reading it!

K - You've made my day! Thanks so much for the kind words and the review!

Quite welcome S. I loved the book, and look forward to the next in the series. (And, yes, I know how reviews can send your soaring, but I still remain honest.)

It's just (still) thrilling when someone reads it at all...and the bees knees when they like it! And if they don't, still awesome that they read my book (MY BOOK!)