Publicists
This week’s review at Suite101 is A.E Moorat’s Henry VIII: Wolfman. I didn’t much like it, not being a fan of monster mash-ups, and it’s nowhere near as good as the author’s Queen Victoria: Demon Hunter, which was far better written, and had some novelty that any follow-ups will inevitably lose.
So I was going to let Wolfman go by without a review.
But Hodder have a publicist, who’s even more annoyingly persistent than they usually are (though Tor have got a particularly odious specimen) and she wouldn’t let it go. Having spammed me with not one but TWO unsolicited hard copies* –stretching my poor elastic walls to their limit– she then e-mailed me asking whether I’d had a chance to read it. At which point I muttered “Okaaaaay…..” and took my gloves off.
Actually, I understand publicists are only doing their job, and maybe they regard even a negative review as being ‘any publicity is good publicity.’ Unfortunately, they never seem to publicize good books and anything that finds it’s way to me via a publicist always seems to be a pile of shite.
And I now look forward to receiving a really good book from a publicist that proves me wrong…
* I don’t mind getting review copies if the publicist has had the courtesy to ASK first. I may say no, but more likely than not I may say yes with the caveat that if I don’t like it, I won’t review it.
