Praise for Pale Immortal
"I went as far as tearing the book up and throwing it in the trash so no one else could read it."
amazon reviewer
i wish she'd made a video of that violent outrage so i could have put it on youtube. i think it would have made a nice promotional tool.
hmmm.....
i wonder if anyone's done a parody of an outraged reader reading a page, then destroying the book. it's hard to tear up a book, so that could have been pretty funny. kind of a misery thing.
wonder if i should do a contest? with a fairly big prize? oh, this could be fun.... maybe a gift certificate to amazon.
that would be funny, but a cash prize would probably hold more incentive.
29 comments:
You could always hire actors and stage the vandalism to your book and get the video up there.
I have to say wtf? but to each their own, I guess...
A life without severed heads, necrophilia and blood drinking is an unhealthy one. I mean, it turns people into book-tearers. And that is a real problem for society.
I loved PI. Even though it made my hair fall out. ;)
Sounds like someone went off their meds. Don't let it bother you.
When I saw that review the old saying "if you can't say something nice then say nothing at all" came to mind.
A poor review is one thing, even the best writers in the world are not immune to this from time to time, but for someone to go as far as saying they tore the book up and threw it in the trash so no one else could read it is simply juvenile.
Nothing says Mentally Deranged like tearing up a book and tossing it in the trash.
I have to say (and this probably reveals something about me), that the singular most memorable scene in Pale Immortal that both horrified and delighted me was the image of the bloated corpse leading the boy through the woods. In my opinion, if a book leaves ANY lasting impression on the reader, one which does not fade away, then that book has been a success. All too often, stories decay into nothingness in our brains.
To the reviewer: Pale Immortal was not cozy, but who ever claimed it was??
That is priceless. I guess I'm fine with severed heads, necrophilia AND blood drinking.
Love the chicken cartoon!
Holy crap! This is a pretty vicious statement and I can't believe someone felt justified in writing this. I'm often amazed how ruthless some inviduals can be and how they don't take into account how their words might effect someone.
My rant for today...
Ooh, I'm so jealous of your bad review!
I really need a copy of Pale Immortal, right now. Anything with too much violence for even one reader to handle is right up my alley. Yum!
I already know you're talented, Anne, and I know I'm gonna love it. The next time I get my allowance *lol*, it's all going for Pale Immortal. I heart Amazon Prime!
(See, how awesome the power of the bad review? Not that I wasn't going to buy it anyway, but the urgency factor has just gone up!)
PS Did I tell you how much I loved your book trailer? I did!
sandra, i'm thinking about the video.
i've been practicing tear up copies of PI. :D
daniel, i SO agree! lol!
heather, and my hair is still falling out. it stopped, then it started again. but i do have a TON of baby hair. big relief there.
patrick: off her meds is right. honestly it doesn't bother me. i do think it's funny, and i think i might actually help sell books. the ones that bother me are the ones i know are saying something i need to hear. or something i already knew but was hoping nobody else would notice. :D
jeff, the tearing up statement was juvenile -- and funny as hell. perfect way to make a point. :D
alex, LOL!! oh, i love that.
bill, i'm not sure the cartoon has much to do with my post, but i've been looking for a place to put it for a couple of weeks. why is the word bum so funny?
kelly, people can be ruthless when they make comments. the attacker has a massive ego to think a book should have been written just for her. it's all about her. nutcase.
s.w. lol! you are so right about the power of a good bad review! :D and i'm so glad you like the book trailer! penguin just put it on their website, so it seems publishers are suddenly taking notice of trailers.
the reviewer -- i forgot to say that her reaction was somewhat justified. not the tearing up and rant, but just her personal feelings about the book. the second i saw the cover i thought romance. and i think romance readers also thought romance when they saw the cover. people who read romance would recognize the cover as having a romance quality to it. people who don't read romance might not see it. i think the cover is deceptive, so in some ways she had good reason to be pissed.
I can see your point about the cover, but as I said in my response to Ms. Rippie-teary, first sentence in the back cover description (which used to be on your Amazon page, as I recall), mentions blood drinking. I suppose if she bought it on a glance at the cover, some justification for misinterpretation is there, but if she really had read "2 or 3" others, could she really be so surprised by the dark themes in your books? Something about her story is striking a bit of a false note with me. Still, it was good for a laugh!
"but if she really had read "2 or 3" others, could she really be so surprised by the dark themes in your books? Something about her story is striking a bit of a false note with me"
good point. i'm always highly suspicious of reader/reviewers who only have one or two reviews up there too. and you're right about the laugh. you can't always laugh at bad reviews, so i love it when one comes along that i can actually enjoy while at the same time feeling confident it can't do any damage. now i'm beginning to wonder if the whole review was just a joke. nah, probably just a nutcase.
Anne, coming in late on this post (what else is new?) but I've been meaning to tell you how much I enjoyed PALE IMMORTAL.
I took it with me on vacation earlier this month, and was completely captivated by Tuonela (although I can't figure out how to pronounce it) and the vivid world you created. There was so much I loved about PALE IMMORTAL, not the least of which being your clear, intelligent prose--whether you were describing a moment spent in the open-air back of a pickup truck or the half-mad hallucinations of someone being tortured near death. Wow. In every scene, I was *there*. You reminded me about the power of language, even as you made me wince and squirm in my seat.
Anyhoo, I plan to blog about the book as soon as I'm finished with my current mess-in-progress. Until then, thanks for a great read!
lara, wow. thank you so much! now i'm floating away.
:)
i didn't know how to pronounce tuonela until the book was done! this is how i think it goes:
two-uh-NELL-uh.
good luck with your current project!
I can't believe someone tore up a book - any book. Little Nazi.
I agree with Jeff - totally juvenile.
PI is a wonderful book.
Anne, admit it--you totally wrote that review!
If liking bloated corpses and blood drinking is wrong, I don't want to be right. I think there's a song in that...
bailey: little nazi -- lol! i do keep wondering if this woman is a romance reader. maybe read one of my books from 10 years ago, then went nuts when this wasn't similar. kind of like kathy bates in misery.
jaye -- wouldn't that be great if i'd written it? haha! so funny!
how about this--
if making love to a corpse is wrong,
i don't wanna be right.
LOL! Is this the right time for one those "the sex was the same but the dishes keep piling up" jokes?
RE: the cover of Pale Immortal, I too thought "romance" when I saw the cover. They should have chopped the guy's chin out and gone with the very atmospheric lower half. It was far more representative of PI than a chin(which you just know is attached to a man with mucho man-titty.) Still, a quick read of the back ought to tell anyone that this is not a warm and fuzzy romance.
alex: yes!
"She said she had a headache and rolled over. How was I supposed to know she was dead? She's always been real quiet."
and i so agree about the man-titty. LOL! i think anybody who's familiar with romance would see the PI cover as romance. it's a direct imitation of some vampire romance covers. when i found they were leaning toward romance, i actually offered to revise and make the book a romance but they didn't want a romance. i'm still confused by the whole thing.
Lara! Tortured near to death...
Oh please someone mail me your copy of Pale Immortal. I'm drooling and can't wait until my next paycheck.
I don't know - I didn't know you wrote romances and I'm familiar with most of the nom de plumes of romance writers. It was a different name then.
Little Nazi - she just reminded me of them - although they burned books, it's the same thing.
s.w. -- quite a few libraries carry pale immortal. ;) if you don't mind cooties.
bailey, and it's been almost 10 years since i wrote romance. yeah, i can't imagine tearing up a book -- unless i had to create a secret compartment for a key or a gun or my heroin.
As a loyal "Anne Fan", I say we form a possee and go get that reviewer! I can even brush-up on my old tomahawk and knife-throwing skills, if you like. Wait...I still have that bullet I didn't have to put thru my computer a couple of months ago. OK, everybody, the sign-up sheet is attached...
I just ordered it from Amazon. Squeeee! Can't wait! :D
(Libraries won't let me in there any more...)
dee, i think the secret is to desensitize the subject ala clockwork orange. maybe start with something like Saw or Faces of Death.
s.w.: i hope it doesn't suck for you. :D really!
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