ONE BY ONE

 5 stars out of 5

Oh, how I envy the creative minds of fiction writers!

Mind you, I'm a writer too - not a bad one, even. And I probably could make a convincing case that writing a newspaper account of the same event 10 different times in 10 different ways gives me some claim to creativity. But the kind that's in this book? Only in my dreams.

That's a roundabout way of saying those dreams came true in this book (which, happily, was written by someone with actual talent for fiction). Not only is it an engrossing story, it took what to me is a new approach that made it stand out among all the others I read every month (86 so far this year). To begin with, there's a timely hook: a British social media tech company called Snoop that offers a wildly popular music app that allows members to "see" what other members are listening to in real time. The shareholders have gathered at a ski chalet for some R and R, but right off the bat, things go a bit haywire with the realization that one who is here was left off the guest list sent to the chalet hosts. Inadvertently? Maybe yes, maybe no.  Then comes the founder's announcement that could spell gloom or doom for the company going forward.

Faced with incoming inclement weather, the group decide to hit the slopes before they're shut down. And from that moment on, things go from bad to worse as an avalanche cuts off all communication with the rest of the world and shareholders start taking hits "one by one." The only things they're sure of is that there's nowhere to go but down (and even going in that direction could lead to dire consequences) and one among them is, shall we say, not a very nice person.

From the middle of the book on, it was hard for me to put down; sorry to say I can't share many of the juicy details without spoiling things for others who haven't yet read the book. Suffice it to say I was happy that an event we'd planned was canceled, thus giving me two straight edge-of-seat hours to finish up. Thoroughly enjoyable, and I thank the publisher, via NetGalley, for providing me with a pre-release copy to read and review.

One By One by Ruth Ware (Gallery/Scout Press, September 2020); 383 pp.

ONE BY ONE

3 stars out of 5

Editor's note: Reading this was quite an experience for me - and not necessarily all positive. Stay tuned at the end for some insights on how to - and how not to - ask someone to review your work.

At just 10 pages, I read this very short story --

offered to me in exchange for an honest review - in about 10 minutes. And the first thing I said to myself when I finished is that the concept has the makings for a more-than-decent book (and if that ever happens, I'd certainly be willing to read it). As it is, especially given a handful of grammatical errors, I have to say it left a lot on the table. Besides that, it took several pages before I figured out who the "I" who was speaking really was - with so few pages, that was a major distraction early on.

Of course, I can't say much about such a short story without giving away too much, but basically, a police officer has been murdered, and his wife is accused of doing the deed. Detective Rick Fellows suspects there's more to the story - and when he determines what it is, he becomes determined to do something about it. The unsaid suggestion seems to be that he's championing a specific "cause" and thus  is willing to circumvent the law to see that his version of justice is done. In fact, it's an issue to which I'm strongly sympathetic as well, but sorry - I don't buy into the concept that the end justifies the means. 

One By One by Sandy Braccey (Amazon Services LLC, November 2018); 10 pp.

NOW FOR THE BACKSTORY: The author contacted me by email to ask if I'd review her "book." That's fine; I'm always leery of such requests, but I give the authors credit for trying to get their horns blown. The first "uh-oh" came when she praised one of my previous book reviews. That, too, happens often - but if you're going to try to butter up a potential reviewer, I suggest you pick something that has at least some connection to what you've written. In this case, it was totally unrelated (and thus an obvious attempt to curry favor).

The next oops came when she said her "book" was just 11 pages. Seriously? I don't even begin to think "book" at less than 200 pages. Heck, it doesn't even qualify for short story status (and a check at Amazon found it listed as only 10 pages (making me wonder where the author found the extra page). But knowing it would take only a few minutes to read, I figured it wouldn't kill me to give it a go.

The next warning signal came when I learned it had been self-published a year ago - and had only one review at Amazon (big surprise - 5 stars. Gosh, wonder which relative wrote that one)? Questionable at best, but I put all that aside and opened the first page with fresh eyes (as I must do with all for-review works no matter what I've previously seen or heard).

The story, such as it is, actually turned out to be relatively well thought out, although it fell way short of its official description. But running into at least two grammatical errors in the course of my 10-minute-or-so read gave me serious pause. Something that short has no excuse not to be error-free; and if you extrapolate to a "normal" 300-page book, you get the probability of 60 such mistakes. Sorry, but that's way beyond my tolerance limit for anyone who wants to be called a writer (granted, I'm a professional editor so I have zero patience for these things, but...)

Finally comes the real kicker: My review at Amazon (as shown above) mysteriously never got posted. I've never had a single one rejected in the hundreds I've submitted over the years, so I can only believe that somehow the author - who self-published the book - managed to quash it (I suppose because it didn't have enough stars or effusive praise). News flash: If you're going to ask for an honest review, you need to be honest as well. Even big-name authors leave not-so-perfect reviews of their work, especially when they've been solicited (the only exceptions to that rule might be if the review contains offensive language or it bears no relation to the book). Suffice it to say I took great pleasure in posting it at Barnes and Noble, Goodreads (where it garnered a number of likes within hours) and here on my book blog.

Bottom line? It's experiences like this that make book reviewers think twice about reading anything that didn't come straight from the publisher. To be sure, from now on I will.

Update: This morning - 24 hours after it was uploaded - I received the standard thank you from Amazon for reviewing this book. I still think something was amiss just because I posted a second review within an hour of this one yesterday morning and received the notice almost immediately. But at least, according to Amazon, it's there. I'm not going to go look.