It was a pretty good one. Got three stars out of five. Clarion Review. I think they're an Indie book outfit. But I'm not going to post it here. Enuf's enuf.
Lessons learned: 1) Didn't get a rave review. 2) Kirkus, which has the biggest clout, gave me the worst and most conservative, least enlightened review. 3) I'm only paying any attention to these reviews at all because I paid for them and need them to put a blurb on the cover. 4) Other than that, you go to all the trouble to spend years writing a book, and then people criticize it? What the fuck is with that!!
Here's the latest cover with a blurb from Blueink.
NOW!! I am not even a successful author (at age 69) much LESS a successful book cover designer!! If this is a good design I have no idea. No one has told me it is. No one has told me it isn't. Am I doing myself a disservice by designing my own cover? Should I hire someone who knows more about it that I do?
In a way, Otorongo may turn out to be nothing more than a rather expensive joke. I have to say I myself like the book, but there's no evidence anyone else does, and if you think about it, how surprising is that? A 334 page book self-published by a totally obscure author. Who's going to put the effort into buying and reading it? That's probably eight or ten hours of someone's time, not to mention the expense. Who's got eight to ten hours and $18.99 to burn? Not knowing anything about what they're getting for it?
Soooo.... I've been honoring my commitment to journal about this experience here on SG, simply as a way of trying to reach a better understanding myself of what I've done and why I've done it.
If anything else develops, I'll chronicle it here. Meanwhile, I have yet to find my first (unpaid) reader.