Shelloquent

All right we all knew this topic had to come up at some point right? I work in digital publishing, so for the most part, my job is all about eBook publicity and marketing. But I also handle a number of select print titles as well, so I'm definitely in a position to be asked that now evergreen question: digital books or print books?

For today's Working Wednesday, I'm going to be promoting another Kensington book that I'm just incredibly proud to have worked on. Alyssa Cole's  AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION  was released yesterday. It's the first in the Loyal League series, and is a historical novel set during the Civil War. It's genre-bending and flat out amazing. AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION Blurb:  As the Civil War rages between the states, a courageous pair of spies plunge fearlessly into a maelstrom of ignorance, deceit, and danger, combining their unique skills to alter the course of history and break the chains of the past . . . Elle Burns is a former slave with a passion for justice and an eidetic memory. Trading in her life of freedom in Massachusetts, she returns to the indignity of slavery in the South—to spy for the Union Army. Malcolm McCall is a detective for Pinkerton's Secret Service. Subterfuge is his calling, but he’s facing his deadliest mission yet—risking his l...

It's been a while, and I've been meaning to post here, but for one reason or another it just hasn't been happening. So I'm going to try to do better this year. I figure why not kick of the new year with something personal. I went back to work last week after my holiday break. Unfortunately I caught a cold and had to take a sick day today. I got a LOT accomplished over the break. Mostly cleaning. I've taken pictures because it was a hell of a process. The way my room looked before was just...it was the physical embodiment of depression. Simple as that. It's not perfectly clean now, but I can get to my drawers and wardrobe, I've given away two bags of clothes for Goodwill, with I'd say at least two more to come.  I've made a lot of plans about how to redo my room, including buying a full-sized loft bed with a desk underneath. That's a little ways off, but knowing it's in the works is doing a lot to brighten my outlook. I got a new stan...

For today's Working Wednesday, I'm going to be promoting the heck out of a book I'm super proud of, and I'm just as proud of the author. Lynn Cahoon's A STORY TO KILL was released yesterday. It's the first in a brand-new print cozy mystery series, which is a first for her. Lynn is well known for her digital Tourist Trap mysteries with Lyrical Press, but she's going to be publishing but in print and digitally with these two separate series. I did a featured staff recommended read which will be live on Kensington's website tomorrow but you get a sneak peek here! I may be a bit biased where it comes to Lynn Cahoon, but it’s for good reason. She always writes a clever, fun mystery with a good hook. But she’s outdone herself with the first book in her brand-new print series, A Story to Kill. Cahoon cleverly blends the right about of mystery, intrigue, and whodunit with a rekindling romance with a hot handyman. What more could you want? A Story to K...

It's been a bit since my last book review. I'd been in a reading slump and decided to read a quick queer novella to jump-start me. I made the right choice.  THE COBBLER'S SOLELESS SON by Meredith Katz Blurb:  Everyone expects Renart Walker to follow in his mother's footsteps and become the cobbler for their little demon-ruled town. That'd be the proper thing to do: keep his head down, live his quiet human life, and try not to get too involved with demons. But Renart has never been terribly concerned with proper, and he isn't interested in a quiet life. His interests are a little more ambitious: he's aiming to catch himself a demon prince. As a human, he'd never be allowed to even get close to Prince Hrahez. The only solution is to make a bargain with a demon, and everyone knows what they want. Still, nothing ventured, nothing gained, and he's got a plan—but it involves tricking a demon. If it doesn't work, nobody in town would want ...

If you've been paying attention on Publishing Twitter today, you might have seen people in all walks - agents, editors, publicists, authors - weighing in on one particular topic: David Benjamin. I won't go into a lot of detail here about what exactly he said because it's already been covered (and I'll link to that), but I did want to say how he is the epitome of the best practices on how not to land yourself an agent, I get it. Rejection can hurt. But a  lot of writers who go on to write some beloved stories have been rejected over and over. JK Rowling is a prime example. And it's fine to blog about your disappointment at yet another rejection. What's not fine is a mean-spirited, belittling, straight-up misogynistic rant about agents who didn't like your ill-prepared pitch. This is what he sounded like to me underneath the gross misogyny. I'll let In the Inbox take it from here. This literary agent intern screencapped the post and some...

Time for another book review! I'll be trying to do these on weekends, especially when I've finished a book that I really want to talk about. And I really want to talk about Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire. EVERY HEART A DOORWAY by Seanan McGuire I have been a Seanan Fan for a few years now. I picked up the first in her October Daye series when I got sick of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files (for many reasons I chose to stop reading it), and found that Seanan's series delivered exactly what I'd wanted from Butcher's. I picked up more and more of her work, increasingly please by what I read. I have a lot of Feels about Seanan's work, and was super excited to pick up Every Heart a Doorway. Blurb: Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children No Solicitations No Visitors No Quests Children have always disappeared under the right conditions; slipping through the shadows under a bed or at the back of a wardrobe, tumbling down rabbit holes...