Quote:
Originally Posted by Giggleton
An aggregated indie site, with multiple contributors will be created eventually though.
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I'm hoping it's coming soon!
@MartinC: Nah, I don't have the web skills, or the passion, or the audience. There's someone more qualified to start it. I'll just be the first in line to fully sink hours of browsing time on it when I should be writing essays for school.
@Ficbot: That's a great model. I'm now more convinced to check out your review site because of that minimum 3 independent reviews feature.
Niche and Variety
My ideal website strikes a balance between niche and variety... say, Speculative Fiction in Canada. Or Horror SF written by authors outside of Europe and North America. If I see something like "The Science Fiction Collective", I'm not going to even look at it unless it already made a name for itself because I already have Asimov.
On the other hand, I'm quite interested in looking at what my fellow Canadians are writing, so I would immediately check out some Canadian specified SF.
As a rule of thumb, if I don't know anything about an indie book, I'm going to assume it's (1) Badly written (2) by an American (no offense to Americans. I love a lot of American writers but there's a lot of traditional exposure for you guys, just sayin') (3) The worst supernatural romance werewolf genre one can possibly think of. Badly photoshopped covers give me that impression. Covers don't matter in the long run if you already have word of mouth, but if there's nothing but the cover and the blurb to go on, then don't get on photoshop fail! Don't get friends to draw/design your covers because your friendship will taint your judgment on the quality of the product.
I'm not hating on that specific genre, the point is, before I know the work, I just assume it's the worst genre for me, and I need to be convinced otherwise pretty quickly.
Proposed Indie Website Model
I changed my mind. I don't want indie e-book manybooks.net. I want indie e-book Pitchfork.
An aggregate of seven reviewers that write books reviews in the style of a magazine. Think Pitchfork. I'm not the biggest fan of Pitchfork, but it works for indie music. I think seven strikes a good community balance, not too big to be "Oh god I'm just reading the mob on goodreads.com", and not too little to be "Oh. Another personal review blog. How nice."
Ideally, at least two of the reviewers already have some name in the community niche, and NOT an indie author trying to muscle in the other indie authors. Someone who used to be an editor at a publishing house, or for a big magazine, or just some kind of relevant personality. If an indie sf reviewer was a writer for i09, then the individual lends credibility to the aggregate.
Each reviewer is in charge of some kind of turf. e.g. old school hard science guy, the witty feminist, etc. Indie authors submit books to be reviewed. If at least four or more reviewers think it's worthy to be reviewed, it gets passed on to the reviewer who's most interested in it.
What is worthy of being reviewed? It's relevant to the niche and (1) It's high quality work or (2) It's unique (3) It's uniquely bad and would be funny to write about.
The Article Format
Each reviewer has a quota of books to review with a rotating cycle, so there's at least two reviews per week.
I want reviews with:
-witty titles
-personality and frequent pop culture references or in-niche references rather than just objective "here's the news" style
-humour, cynicism, and above all--enthusiasm
-a fearlessness to absolutely trash some works. I'd rather have a site that's too picky than too nice. It can be controversial and hurtful for some authors, but it's exposure. Uniquely funny bad press could actually get people interested enough to see what your work is about. Again, with the Pitchfork example, they hate a lot of stuff for ridiculous reasons, but people still read their articles and check out what's being reviewed to prove Pitchfork wrong. Also, there's a reason why Simon Cowell is very popular. There just needs to be one or two Simons out of seven. As long as their reviews are entertaining, readers would keep coming back.
-a comments section, it's a community.
Quality over quantity. Why should I be reading these reviews if I could actually just go out and read Asimov? The reviews should be a quality product unto themselves. They're not competing with forums for my eyes, they're competing with more easily accessible traditional publications and other special interest magazines.
Website Design
Like an online magazine, I'd like there to be sort of big headline reviews (by anticipated releases by the niche) with a preview on the main page, and the other reviews off to the side. Having a online magazine experience makes me more keen on browsing quirky articles, rather than the linear blog style. Good design, and good pictures are important. Cover pictures aren't important (let's be honest, most covers are bad), but pictures that capture the humour/essence of the article are necessary. This helps too because the unit of the article could reach beyond the "one article per book review." No, the writer can throw out reviews of five books in one article if it's tied in really well to a theme (e.g. "Hollow earth extraordinaires!"). Don't give it more words than it needs.
Audience
I want a website with a reader audience in mind, not an indie writer audience. If it's a website about indie writing with only indie writers checking it out, the reader won't care, because it's the same as the forums with the indie writers trying to sale their wares to each other and no one biting. Don't promote how-to-write self-help books and workshops on the website, that's a deal killer. It's like, great, everyone here can't write to begin with, why should I read these reviews again?
Instead, promoted material should be stuff that ties into the niche. If the niche covers steampunk, have some cross-over indie promotion with a steampunk group at etsy. If there's humour and sf, promote the indie artist that's been doing 1001 things with "Don't Panic" screen prints. Book promotions are okay if if 1 in 2 of the audience will like it. If it's just random book promotions on the website, then the credibility of the website goes down. Please think of the audience!
C'mon indie book reviewers! Aggregate!