Oooooohhhhh dear…

I have a dilemma. And I’m not quite sure what to do about it.

I queried the owner of an important mainstream review website about Mortal Touch. He replied that he didn’t usually review vampire books “but this sounds interesting” and to send a copy. I did, back in August.

He just e-mailed me with the review. Hey, it’s great. He gave Mortal Touch five hearts (the top rating). He’s recommended it to Book Sense–which is terrific, since I just sent out a mailing to bookstores. It’s a short review, but positive.

So, what’s my dilemma? Well…there’s a little inaccuracy in the book description. Here’s the review:

Regan Calloway is a talented psychic investigator who has escaped the notoriety of police investigation work, seeking happiness in a Massachusetts small town second-hand store. Despite her attempts to live a quiet life, she is drawn into an investigation centered around a series of unusual assaults. Regan is able to picture incident details by just simply touching victims and accused attackers. Not only is she drawn back into the spotlight of attention, she also finds herself drawn into a relationship with a centuries-old vampire and a gang of were-wolves.
The author has done an admirable job of portraying the challenges of running a small retail business in a very accurately manner. She also does a great job of bringing a ocultic subject into the realm of reality. Her characters develop nicely and her points of view work out nicely. We rated this novel five hearts.

“A gang of were-wolves?!?” How did were-wolves get into my novel? They’re in everybody ELSE’S books…and therein lies my dilemma.

I know book reviews can make mistakes in the synopsis. The reviewer is reading tons of books and writing fast and pounding the reviews out and gets wires crossed. I know that. It’s just that THIS mistake can cost me. The whole vampire-werewolf thing is now such a hackneyed cliche in vampire fiction–as Madrigalist has pointed out, agents and editors are griping actively about how sick they are of seeing it–that it makes my book look like something it definitely is not. People are going to read this review and think, “oh, god, more vampires and were-wolves, again, can’t anyone do anything different…!” and they won’t pursue the book further.

Getting away from cliches like that is the main reason I’m writing this series! I don’t want people to think there are were-wolves in Mortal Touch!

But getting a review on this website is a big deal. Getting plugged to Book Sense is a really big deal. I’m a brand new small press and this is my first book. I don’t know what will happen if I complain, however deferentially and politely. It would be nice if this gentleman would review my future books.

What do I do?!? Of course, I’m going to thank him copiously for his review. But do I mention the error, or not? If it didn’t have the potential to be so prejudicial against my book (after all, Jonathan isn’t “centuries old,” either, but I’m not choking up over that, and the review has typos, besides), I’d let it pass, but…I just don’t know how much harm it could do. Will people who hate were-wolves not buy the book, and I’ll lose sales? Will people who love were-wolves hate the book and blame me? Will people just pay attention to the five hearts and the fact that I got reviewed at all, and recommended to Book Sense, and figure the synopsis doesn’t mean much, anyway?

Gods. I really feel like a noob here. I’m just stuck.