6 October

Border collies Different paths

by Jon Katz
Splitting up

I’m glad Rose had her bookstore appearance Tuesday night. Now, it’s Izzy’s turn. Izzy loves touring as much as Rose loves herding. They are inseperable, but going to split up for awhile. Rose was delighted to get out of that bookstore, and Izzy can’t wait to get into one. We are adding Columbus, Ohio to the book tour, hoping to find a place for a reading/signing on Sunday, October 17. Random House is setting it up.

6 October

First bad review: “Dog lovers will like it.”

by Jon Katz
Good reviews, bad reviews

“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.

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