More convolutions with reviews and conventions…

So. On September 6th, I queried a genre specific website, which shall remain nameless, about reviewing Mortal Touch. I got a personal reply right away, saying that I could send a review copy either by PDF or as a hard copy. I sent the PDF because it was quicker (and cheaper). All this time, I’ve been watching that site and waiting to see if I would get a review. The site recently announced that it was celebrating a milestone, and then did a re-design, which looks very nice. It’s an attractive site.

This past week, I got an e-mail from the site owner. She must have been cleaning out her e-mail, because she was responding to the same original query letter that I sent in September. She explained that she was setting me up with an “author” page on her website–which is great! But…she apparently had no record of the PDF I sent to review. I’m not even sure now if she ever got it. And, she explained, she is no longer accepting electronic review copies. I was welcome to send a finished book, and she gave the address, but of course, she wasn’t guaranteeing a review.

So I reflected for about two minutes on the vicissitudes of the Internet, packed up a review copy to send Priority mail, and sent the site owner an e-mail thanking her copiously for setting me up as an Author on her site, and promising to add links to BLUM’s links page and blog (I already had her listed in the large general links section of my research website).

Yesterday the site owner e-mailed me that she’d received the book and she’s taking it with her to read on vacation this weekend.

Then, I got a large envelope from Locus magazine. I was puzzling over that on the way home–I doubted that a mention in their “Received” lists warranted even a tear sheet, let alone a free magazine. They’d sent me a copy of the September issue (which I didn’t have, actually–I’d bought August’s, and then I was waiting for October because I knew that’s the one that would list Mortal Touch, if they did at all). There was also an advertising rate card, which I am considering, and a letter. The letter mostly concerned advertising–and again, if I was going to buy a print ad anywhere, Locus would be at the top of the list–but it also began, “Thank you for the final copy of Mortal Touch. It will be passed on to our reviewing staff for possible review, and listed both in the magazine and in our internet database. A description and ordering information will be included free of charge.”

Hmm. Maybe I shouldn’t give up on getting a review in Locus just yet.

I was looking at the member list for World Fantasy Convention last night. There are some pretty impressive names on the roster–just as attendees, not featured guests. That means they’ll be hobnobbing with the rest of us members. Boris Vallejo, Peter Straub, Martin H. Greenburg, Joe Haldeman, Diana Paxson, Charlaine Harris, Nancy Kilpatrick, E.E. Knight, Suzy Charnas, P.D. Cacek, Ramsey Campbell, George R.R. Martin, Alan Dean Foster, Patricia McKillip, Christopher Golden (who I have to hide from), F. Paul Wilson, Jane Yolen…holy mackerel. I mean, I’m psyched, but…sheesh! And I can deduct the whole thing as a business expense! I have no idea if I’ll be given a reading time. There are still a lot of unassigned reading spots. I believe that I am entitled to participate as an author in the Autograph Reception on Friday night–but I’ll have to see about that. I’ll be taking a couple of cartons of books with me, anyway.

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