- Because you call me Bites.
- Because you call me LitBites.
- Because you call me nothing at all.
- Because you send me mass emails and I've never worked with you before.
- Because you're self-published.
- Because I've never worked with you before.
- Because you send me your entire manuscript as a PDF attachment.
- Because you shower me with praise for my blog but can't get my name right.
- Because you tell me you've read my policy and yet you still insist on contacting me.
- Because you actually have read my policy, quote from it, and request anyway.
How to remedy this -
- If you've never worked with me before, don't bother formatting an email let alone sending one. Read why here.
- Get my name right. It's all over my blog. There's no reason why you should be calling me Bites.
- Take me off of your mass emailing list or I will spam you.
- Don't send me anything as an attachment, ESPECIALLY if I've never worked with you before. Don't be presumptuous in thinking I'm actually going to read anything you send me, ESPECIALLY if it's 400 fucking pages.
- Don't lie to me. It's a bad foot to get off on. And I will know if you're lying. It will be heinously obvious.
- Your mom may think you're special, but I don't. Don't read my review policy and decide you're so super awesome that you should still request a review. You're not. Your tactic will fail.
Quite frankly, I really don't care that my review policy and it's update post are a little lengthy. If you want any iota of hope of me reading your work, you'll read it and follow it as closely as humanly possible or I will release your email into the internet void like a fart into a hurricane. I may not present myself as a professional in connection with my blog but that doesn't mean professionalism should be checked at the door when authors are trying to get their books read. Do it right and save yourself a lot of time. I respond to all of my emails. If you don't get a response from me, even if it's a nice decline, it means you sent me an email when you shouldn't have because you couldn't be bothered to actually read my policy. Which, in turn, means I couldn't be bothered to consider your email.
So, at the end of the day, all you have to do is read my policy. I'm not taking on any more new books at this time and I'll only accept reviews from an approved list which only I know. If you don't think you're on that list, you're probably not. Listen to your gut. If you're self-published, don't even bother, even when I lift my restrictions. I'm not reviewing your books. Considering the bulk of the review request emails I get are from self-pubbed authors, it only furthers my belief that they're unprofessional and it probably reflects in their work. No, I don't feel bad about it. Why? Because they shouldn't be emailing me to begin with. If they read my policy, they'd know that.
READ MY POLICY. I didn't create it because I was bored. If you can't bother, neither can I. And for the love of fuck don't think you're better than it and attempt to request a review anyway. You'll only anger me immensely and I might be so inclined to respond. Trust me. In that instance, that's the last thing you want. At this point, I'm just fucking tired of people not being able to follow directions. As seemingly educated adults, it really shouldn't be this big of a problem. It saddens me on the inside that it is.
