Elitist Book Reviews

So. We had a contest. All sorts of people entered. We were expecting one or two good ones amidst several crappy ones. As it happens, nearly all the submissions were solid. However, some were just better than others. We ended up with three "winners" who are going to enjoy doing a couple reviews a month for us. So, here they are, along with reasons why we chose them:

Shawn Boyles--Turns out we know this guy. He is one of the lovely fellows over at Rocket Road Trip. He sent us over some thoughts on JULIAN COMSTOCK (which were near identical to Steve's) as well as some other reviews as a portfolio of sorts. His reviews were well written (you will see his review of Connie Willis' BLACKOUT shortly), and he tends to share similar opinions on novels with us.

Vanessa Christenson--She sent in a review of THE FOLDING KNIFE (as well as a half-dozen other reviews as her own portfolio). As Nick put it, "She like read my mind..." A scary thought, we know. She also proposed a solid idea for some specific reviews (you'll see what we mean). Elitist indeed.

Dan Smyth--We are going to be honest here (aren't we always?). Dan almost didn't make it. It was between him and two others (who it wouldn't be fair to mention). You see, Dan has this crush on KJ Parker. We don't share this sentiment. Even though he heaped far too much praise on THE FOLDING KNIFE, his tone was near perfect. He just fit. It also helps that he was able to recognize his own susceptibility to Parker's faulty charms (we all have them...mostly), and he supplied us with his opinions on other novels.

As you can see, we primarily picked people who wrote well, agreed with us (duh), and supplied us more than one review. Some of the problems other reviews had that held them back were not agreeing with us (duh), a propensity to only rehash the plot of the novel without talking about why is was GOOD or BAD, had stuff in their reviews that was incorrect, or it just wasn't written how we liked. It's our blog. We pick who we want, and we want to make sure they match with our general way of thinking.

With that, we want to thank everyone for their time and submissions. Congrats to the winners! This will truly be a way for more reviews to come out, and for all the readers of our awesometastic blog to benefit. In a change from the method mentioned in the rules of the contest, our new reviewers are going to write in First Person. Only we (Steve and Nick) will be writing in the Hive Mind style...cause that's how we really are.

The End

So, you want to be an Elitist Reviewer too? Well, you are in luck.

Contrary to popular belief, we do have lives. We work full-time, attend college, have families, aspire to be authors ourselves, and require sleep (sometimes). In short, we want to recruit a few peoples to be reviewers for us.

Here is what would be required of you:

1) Be a US resident. UPDATE: We changed our minds. So there. You can be from anywhere, but the book reviews will adhere to the US release schedule.
2) Read and review at least one to two books a month--if you read and review more, that's fine too. At times, we may very well direct you on what books to read--we have Billy Corgan-like issues. Other times we will leave it up to you, as long as you tell us what you are going to review.
3) We will read and edit your review before hand.
4) If you are located in Provo or Salt Lake City, Utah, we may give you an ARC to read. If not, become friends with your local library and/or B&N. We don't make money off this blog, so paying money to ship you ARCs just isn't feasible.
5)Your reviews will follow our Hive-mind format, and you will avoid profanity in the review itself.

Make sense? Good.

This is a serious offer for those who want to make a serious effort. We have pride in our work, and we are also control freaks. We want your work to be high-quality, and we want it to be reliable. If you don't think you can be reliable, don't bother entering our "contest."

This is a competition. We will pick a book, and you will read and review it. Here is how it will go down:

1) We pick a book or two.
2) You read it and review it.
3) You email us the review along with your "I'm a US resident" details.
4) We read your review. We will judge it on originality, quality of writing (it doesn't have to be perfect, we WILL edit you reviews after all), clarity of writing, and whether or not your review was in line with what we thought. We want you to have similar tastes as us. Shocker right?
5) The one or two reviewers we felt were best, we will choose to be permanent reviewers on EBR.

Again, EBR is a big deal to us. We are beginning to show up on the covers of books. We want to maintain the confidence that publishers, agents, editors, publicists, and readers have in us. We are special, and we want to keep it that way.

The book of choice for the contest?

DUST OF DREAMS by Steven Erikson
or
THE FOLDING KNIFE by KJ Parker
or
JULIAN COMSTOCK by Robert Charles Wilson

This contest will go until the 4th of June.

Q-- Can I review both books for the contest?
A-- Sure, if they both are solid reviews, it will give us confidence in you. However, if one sucks, it will screw you.

Q-- How long should the reviews be?
A-- Look at our reviews (there are dozens of them). While the lengths may vary in some cases, they are almost all around the same length.

Q-- Is it OK to put spoilers in the review?
A-- No. If you do, we will send ninja-zombies after you. Then we will delete your submission.

Q-- Where will I be on the EBR totem-pole?
A-- We (Nick and Steve) are the main dudes (and handsome ones at that). The site is ours. You will be an active participant, which puts you between us, and the guest reviewers who only participate occasionally.

Please email us with any other question.