The eBook on eBooks by Aaron Patterson

Nutshell:  Kindle bestselling author Aaron Patterson cashes in on his success with this crappy little waste of three bucks.  One star.

Review:  This exceedingly slim volume contains absolutely nothing you can't glean from any succesful indie writer's blog.  Konrath's, for example.  If you're serious about indie publishing, then you've already learned everything in this ridiculous excuse for a book.  Patterson had the opportunity to really write an interesting--perhaps even inspiring--story, but instead whipped this paper-thin thing off in an afternoon, apparently.  A couple of things stick out:  do you really need a book that defines an e-book for you (meaning literally points out that an e-book is an electronic book, not a book in print) not once, but twice?!  If you haven't figured that out, then you probably are going to have a pretty short career as an indie author.  Second, despite the exhortation to get your books professionally converted so that they look good, you would think that Patterson's own book would have page breaks in the proper places and wouldn't have the odd "Table of Contents" fragment at the end.  Or is it just me who would think that?

Rating:  One star.  Seems like a cynical way to make money off the hopes of indie authors, and really a waste of money.  It would be a waste of time too, but it only took ten minutes to read, so I can't complain about that too much.

Venice Vampyr by Tina Folsom

Hi everybody, LJ here.  For some reason Will decided to pass on the review of the vampire romance book.  Big surprise! J  OK, anyway, here’s the scoop:  This is an older book in indie terms—things move pretty fast for some self-publishers, and apparently Tina Folsom kicks them out pretty fast.  Venice Vampyr was apparently published only back in December 2010 and she’s already on number three in the series.  So is this erotic paranormal romance for you?  And what does that mean anyway?

Well, more than anything else, it means hair-raising language.  I’m talking the most explicit, down and dirty language you can imagine.  Or even stronger than that!

But let’s start things with the story.  We don’t do spoilers here at BHBR, but it’s not much of a reveal to say that the story gets started when a human woman saves a vampire from drowning.  How does he want to thank her?  With sweet, sweet lovin’, and here’s where that naughty language comes in.  The author doesn’t hold back at all with her descriptions or language, and you’ll feel like you’re watching a porn film when reading this book.  Strangely, although I understand why Folsom’s books have been selling if they’re all like this one, I found the language really jarring.  I’m no prude, believe me [Note from Will:  I can attest to that; LJ is not a prude], but with the elegant backdrop of Venice for this book, it’s a bit much to hear dialogue that could have been lifted from the script of “MILF Gang Bang Vol. 4”.

Even that could have been overcome if the book were just better.  But outside of the undeniably arousing sex scenes, the rest of the book is just boring.  Folsom tried to spice it up—so to speak—by inserting photos of Venice that she took herself, but it only showed that she should stick to writing and avoid photography. 

In the end, I’ll put it like this—I guess I don’t mind having read it, but I found it disappointing both as a romance as well as erotica.  I don’t recommend Venice Vampyr for most readers and I’m going to give it two stars.

LJ