ClumsyMonkey.net

Howdy fellow CM-ers, been way too long--but the toot is back, amigos! ...and I need a favor: a biggie.

A novel I've written has recently made it to the semi-final round in a break-thru novel contest being put on by Amazon, and I could desperately use some thumbs up posted on the "user reviews" section of mine (the first chapter is available as a free download). The more reviews I have, the better I look--and the better chance I likely have of advancing to the next round... which would mean my book being PUBLISHED by Penguin Press. So, huzzah!

My page is here...


http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0011ZCAEC

So, PLEASE go review it, give me some kudos on how stellar my first chapter is!!!

Thanks guys!

Done, nice work.

Keep us updated and good luck!

Will do! Much appreciated!

maybe post here more too! contribute and you'll get even more support.

Hey! I get around here as much as I can! College, work, and the pain of dial-up severely limits my internet fun time these days.

Dial up still exists?

Even I don't have dial up!

I don't buy it!

I swear! It exists to this day... and in my new place!

Sweet pad, low rent, decent location... and then the dreaded catch: flippin' DIAL-UP for flips sake.

Ugh.

So... go check out my chapter and write a nice review so I'll win the contest, get my book published, get rich, move to a better place, and have DSL again!

Its really good, kid. Really good. A great excerpt to get people interested.

I rated it a 5 in my own personal voting thing (I wasn't sure how to leave stars without writing a review - and I didn't want to write an entire review, see below - other than rating it for myself so I hope that counts) because I think you've worked hard on it and I know how much work goes into something like that, especially to get it even remotely ready for publication. And I wish you the best of luck in getting it published.

But I'll be honest with you - I didn't really like it. I think it was too wordy and almost cliched (sp) with the descriptions and the style isn't quite what I like to read. It almost feels like you're trying too hard. Now I'm not saying it's bad, but in the stage it's at right now, I wouldn't be interested in buying it. I've read some of what you've posted on here (I'm pretty sure that was you since you're the only person I remember actually regularly posting writing) and I liked your other stuff much better.

So good luck, and I hope that you can get it published, and if it doesn't get published through Amazon's thing, I hope a publisher sees it and "takes you under his/her wing" so to speak. That sounds patronizing (which I'm not trying to do), but I can't think of a better way to put it! I think it could be great but I think it needs a lot more work before I would spend $25 on a hardcover, or $14 on a trade paperback.

myownsatellite wrote:I rated it a 5 in my own personal voting thing (I wasn't sure how to leave stars without writing a review - and I didn't want to write an entire review, see below - other than rating it for myself so I hope that counts) because I think you've worked hard on it and I know how much work goes into something like that, especially to get it even remotely ready for publication. And I wish you the best of luck in getting it published.

But I'll be honest with you - I didn't really like it. I think it was too wordy and almost cliched (sp) with the descriptions and the style isn't quite what I like to read. It almost feels like you're trying too hard. Now I'm not saying it's bad, but in the stage it's at right now, I wouldn't be interested in buying it. I've read some of what you've posted on here (I'm pretty sure that was you since you're the only person I remember actually regularly posting writing) and I liked your other stuff much better.

So good luck, and I hope that you can get it published, and if it doesn't get published through Amazon's thing, I hope a publisher sees it and "takes you under his/her wing" so to speak. That sounds patronizing (which I'm not trying to do), but I can't think of a better way to put it! I think it could be great but I think it needs a lot more work before I would spend $25 on a hardcover, or $14 on a trade paperback.

Thanks a lot for the feedback, I really appreciate it. You make some good points, and I agree that it is a decidedly different take from previous efforts. I hate that it wasn't your cup of tea, and I'll definitely take heed of your thoughts on the over-wordiness. I actually started this whole thing after reading Dante's Divine Comedy in an upper-level Lit course, and I fear I may have over-educated myself, so to speak, and over-written it quite a bit more than I would have previously.

...there's always the next draft!

Haha yeah. Honestly I really like it and I'm really hoping that the ending will match up to the expectations that I have. It's the type of the story that when you are reading it, you need to know that the author knows something that you don't, and that it will have an ending with grandeur. If you do have a draw back its your diction. I've argued with you over this, forever. haha. Being concise and audience accessible is a tough thing to do.

But yeah, I think its wicked. I'm having a hard time writing a review though. It's something about my account... :S

trentm32 wrote:Thanks a lot for the feedback, I really appreciate it. You make some good points, and I agree that it is a decidedly different take from previous efforts. I hate that it wasn't your cup of tea, and I'll definitely take heed of your thoughts on the over-wordiness. I actually started this whole thing after reading Dante's Divine Comedy in an upper-level Lit course, and I fear I may have over-educated myself, so to speak, and over-written it quite a bit more than I would have previously.

...there's always the next draft!

I'm glad you didn't get all pissed off at me for that...I know lots of people who would have I could tell from your own little blurb about it that it must have been inspired by the DC and while I do a lot of work with intertextuality in my field, it did make me a little wary because the DC is such a masterpiece, and it almost frightens me to see "new" novelists take on such a HUGE task! I'm glad you're thinking of revising, and I really think that you can do it justice if you work on your style just a bit

Booyah! Via the contest, my full novel was reviews by Publisher's Weekly, and here's the review...

"In this modern re-telling of Dante’s Inferno, orphaned brothers Jake and Chris Dunton are the only family that they have in the world. After an accidental fire and near death experience for Chris during a visit to the now-abandoned home of their childhood, Chris, studying for the priesthood, begins a crisis of faith that he just cannot shake. In a plan to confirm his faith, Chris dies in a bathtub of ice but his soul lingers on earth, haunting Jake at every turn. This starts Jake on a vivid and well-conceived tour across the Netherworld complete with his very own Virgil and Beatrice, in the hopes that he will find and comfort the tortured soul of his brother. The author shows great skill in reinterpreting and re-imagining Dante’s tale. Although the prose offers few bells and whistles, this simply written novel is, nonetheless, compulsively readable."

...

I did a random sampling of a few dozen other pieces in the semifinals, and many of them received solidly negative reviews... so I apparently don't, like, suck! Huzzah!

Thats awesome, dude!

Congratulations!!

My friends! Reviews please! :-P