Thursday, June 20, 2013

Calling All Readers: Is That You?

Blessed Are The Peace Makers will be ready for fresh eyes by midnight on June 30th. My birthday. It's completion is my present to me.

Yeah. I know. That's ten days. A lot has to happen to get there. But I'm here to tell you. June 30th. It's a-happening.

So here goes.

I need a reader. Well. Readers. An Alpha. Betas.

Is it weird that I don't have a special someone to ask? I don't. A few people have come to mind. Is it weird that most of them are men? I need both.

This is HUGE people. Why?

Not because I have three years invested in this book. Or because my heart and my guts are splashed all over it. Or that my words and my work will be on display in a way they have never been before.

Nor because people might not like it. Or that it might actually suck. Or I might suck.

No, none of those, though each are big in their own right.

It's huge because it's a lot to ask of a reader. It's no small thing reading a 90,000 word manuscript, nor is it trivial giving advice or opinions on the work. Especially if you don't end up liking it.

But I must ask anyway and I do so from the humblest of all positions. Many of my blogger friends have forgotten me. For good reason. Seldom, if ever, do I tiptoe through the Blogverse, and I haven't regularly in a couple of years. I even bailed to Wordpress for a while.

And yet. Here I stand. Asking for help.

Not just any help. Specific help. The novel takes place in the not-too-far-distant future. There is death. Impending destruction. Magic. Shape-shifting. Romance. Explicit sex, some same-gender. Aliens. And other fantastical situations.

By the way. Readers, by definition, are just that. Readers. You don't have to be a writer to be a reader.

So. Whaddya think? Willing to read it?

Yes? Wow! You're a-MAZING! Shoot me an email at droherrell@aol.com or leave a comment below. (If you can't, won't or don't, I still love you. I understand. Believe me, I really do. I'd love to hear your thoughts, either way.

Thanks y'all, YOU ROCK! Olivia J. Herrell

4 comments:

A.T. Post said...

What's the difference between an alpha and a beta reader? As an aspiring author myself, I should probably know this.

I want to say "Count me in. I'll be one of your alphas. Or betas. Or whatever you want me to be." But I'm trying to decide if (a) I'll have enough time (I have my family vacation coming up for the month of July) and (b) whether I'm really the right person to be critiquing your work.

Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. Barré said...

Postie, I'm guessing the Alpha is simply the first set of eyes other than mine that reads it. The Betas wouldn't get it till any changes had been made from that.

You were actually one of the first people I thought of and a) I can be patient and b) why not? I wouldn't hold you to a full-on critique, just a nudge in the right direction if I fly out to left field or ground out, etc. You can tell me whether my bad guys are bad enough, my good guy's likeably-flawed enough to be endearing but not annoying. Those kinds of things.

That boils it down to: if it's something you think you might like to read, do. If not, don't. (And I promise I'll understand.)

Thank you for being here! Olivia

Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. Barré said...

Postie, I'm guessing the Alpha is simply the first set of eyes other than mine that reads it. The Betas wouldn't get it till any changes had been made from that.

You were actually one of the first people I thought of and a) I can be patient and b) why not? I wouldn't hold you to a full-on critique, just a nudge in the right direction if I fly out to left field or ground out, etc. You can tell me whether my bad guys are bad enough, my good guy's likeably-flawed enough to be endearing but not annoying. Those kinds of things.

That boils it down to: if it's something you think you might like to read, do. If not, don't. (And I promise I'll understand.)

Thank you for being here! Olivia

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