Gulp...

[rachelmanija]

http://www.kirkusreviews.com/kirkusreviews/reports_analysis/weekly_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000964306

I'm bracing myself, since Kirkus hates everything. Kirkus called Robin McKinley's Deerskin "lurid, turgid fluff." (I didn't look that phrase up-- I'm not Robin McKinley, and that's still stuck in my head for all eternity.)

But hey, lots of books don't get reviewed in Kirkus at all, and that would be worse.

Comments

[octopedingenue]

...great, Deerskin is one of my favorites and that phrase is going to stick in my head for all eternity too.

I'm crossing my fingers for you, although I'm not placing much value in Kirkus' opinion here. (Lurid--LURID--lkjasdlfjlja!)

[literaticat.livejournal.com]

YAY! SHIGURE ICON!

Totoroooo!

[octopedingenue]

Snarky porn-writing dogs are love.

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

Good lord, that phrase almost sings, in a terrible way. People should get 100 years of bad karma for writing sentences like that.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Anyone who reads Kirkus' reviews for any length of time understands they hate everything. It's like deciphering academic reference letters, where even the worst candidate gets effulgent praise and you have to pick it apart very carefully and read between the lines to get the actual recommendation.

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

Yep. XD

[blackholly.livejournal.com]

You know, they liked Tithe, and the review of Valiant was ambivalent, so you never know. Personally, I don't see how they *couldn't* love your book.

wellll,

[literaticat.livejournal.com]

They could be smoking crack.

Re: wellll,

[blackholly.livejournal.com]

Okay, point.

[pameladean]

Kirkus is just evil. Especially the way they sound as if they are going to say something laudatory and then zing you in the last sentence. Bastards. They quite often fail to produce no possible quote out of context for book covers, though. It's some evil game because they are all bored. If it's not, then it's something even worse.

P.

[marith.livejournal.com]

Lurid, turgid fluff? Whoever said that about Deerskin is a crack-smoking dork, and shall not be redeemed even if they praise your book.

But I hope they do anyway.

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

That's cool! You've hit the big time.

[mistressrenet.livejournal.com]

Any publicity is good publicity. And they do hate everything.

[gastonmonescu.livejournal.com]

How can fluff be turgid?

If you go into this expecting them to hate it, you may be pleasantly surprised. (Spoken like a true former-pessimist.)

[larryhammer]

Yes, but Kirkus hates genre writing worse than anything else.

---L.

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

I hope you're pleasantly surprised.

If it's any consolation, Publishers Weekly called Moonwise "utter nonsense," which isn't even absurdly quotable.

Nine

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

Given the context, I do find that absurdly quotable.

[misia.livejournal.com]

Good luck. And yeah, you're right, Kirkus hates everything, so if nothing else you'll get a good laugh out of it (says the woman who is apparently "proof that being literate doesn't save you from being a boring slut" -- not a Kirkus review but my favorite trash-talkin' quotation from a review of my own work).

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I don't think anyone will call me a slut, but I am anticipating something like, "This flip, shallow "memoir" is the latest proof that nobody should be allowed to write about their life until they're at least fifty years old."

[rilina.livejournal.com]

Kirkus is notorious in my office for reviews with wild factual errors. Or, better yet, reviews that clearly seem to have been based on extrapoloation from press releases rather than actual reading of the book. *sigh*