“Rose In A Storm” got its first critical review today, in The Washington Post, which didn’t like the novel but said that dog lovers would like it. Not sure how to take that.

Reviews are an integral part of a writer’s life, and reviews are changing, moving towards online user reviews and away from mainstream media reviews. Still, mainstream reviews are significant, and since I put the good ones up, it’s only fair to put the bad ones up too. Bad reviews have a right to live, and a writer friend, a mentor,  once told me if you can only handle criticism but not praise, pick another line of work. It was very good advice, and I took it to heart.

I like praise, and have gotten a lot of it,  but I’ve never written a book that didn’t get criticism too. Criticism isn’t as nice as praise, but one thing I love about books – and ideas – is that every person reacts so differently to every one. Sort of an amazing thing. Another friend told me that I had a genius for being unwittingly controversial. This is true too.