We, Dear Readers, have entered a new era of reading. The digital age has led to Kindle, Smashwords, Nook, and a score of other digital distributors that put everything we could possibly want to read in front of us in mere seconds. Anyone and everyone is a publisher or author. If you can type it, you can publish it. We see the good, the bad, and the ugly.
With books from established publishers, new publishers that pop up overnight, and self published authors, we are flooded with new fiction on a daily basis. Professional covers are affordable for even starving writers, and editing services are available for almost any budget. The opening chapters of a book are often heavily revised due to being entered in contests and critiques, so that the start of a book can be perfected far beyond that of the remaining chapters. So how do we determine what is good, what is bad, and what is downright ugly?
I have to be honest, if I’m looking at a new author cold—that is, without some sort of recommendation or knowing something about them—a cover is what gets me first. I’m sorry to say that I’ve seen way too many covers that look thrown together, Then, when I read a bit of the book, the prose isn’t any better. That doesn’t mean a good cover guarantees a good book—wouldn’t that be an easy clue! But I’ve found that an author who’s willing to put some time or money into a good presentation is more likely to care about the product they’re delivering.
So what you read these days? Do you stick with the tried and true, or do you try new authors from the plethora of fiction? How do you choose from all the books that now fill the digital stores? Are you usually happy with your choices, or disappointed? Do you prefer your books to come through some sort of gatekeeper like a publisher, or are you finding self published books stretching beyond the box into new, exciting territory?
Leave a Comment