Though he is a member of the guild, if that makes any difference. 
MINDTOUCH by MCA Hogarth
I have to admit to being daunted by the size of the book. 400 pages. OMG, I wanted a writing sample, not a bible. I have 100 unread books in my queue! Did I really want to push most of those back in order to relate better to a name in a chat room. And it was Book One of Two. Who writes Duologies, anyway?
But my plan is to write furry exclusively at least for a year and M.C.A. Hogarth is certainly well liked and respected, so I put the book in the top ten queue (Mount TBR is large and requires a map), and one day, I picked up this book, having doubts about letting a whole batch of new books cut to the front of the line of my books To Be Read. I picked a page at random… I read the jump rope scene with the great untangling… and I went back to Amazon and ordered Book Two, MindLine.
And to the giggles of a friend named Munch, I was into the story by 40 pages and I immediately announced on Twitter that I was looking forward to seeing a M on M romance take place.
OK, that doesn’t exactly happen, but it is a romance with three very alien/cultural vectors going on (college being one of them) and it was a very satisfying read.
Here are some of the highlights.
1 - Domesticity is used to great effect. It’s used with humor, it’s used to emote, and it’s used to show the growing connection, even when unease is present, between our two leads.
2 - Deportment and conformation… for psychics, there’s sure a lot of talk about body language and uncertainties about what people mean when they say stuff. I really found that refreshing.
3 - The girls in the hospital. OMG, this author made me cry in at least three places. Once for being happy, once for being sad, and once because Jahir had dreams, not nightmares, but dreams of dying so slowly in inches in a montage of banality that Jahir could not defend himself against.
Maggie took banality and made my heart twist with it. For three days after that, I stopped writing. The bar was simply raised too high.
I can’t count the times I wanted to slap Jahir. I can’t count the number of times I wanted to shake Vasiht’h to his senses.
The romance here was real, without sexual longing.
I’ve known of asexual people but I’ve always seen them as a thing apart… like how atheists are considered a religion and yet they are not… or black being the absence of colour yet still a colour… I’m sure I’m explaining that imperfectly, but that is exactly what I mean… my understanding of asexual IS imperfect.
This helped, I think.
I really am quite impressed
I loved the culture and the universe and these characters. They are fighting for the lives… their happiness… and there is not a single true villain in the piece.
Still, I hope to see these two be intimate in the next book… whatever form that intimacy should take; I want to be there for it.
Nice review!
Was it really 400 pages? It felt on the short side to me
It’s nice to have furry lit reviewed in our forums (fora?), but also send those reviews to a public furry site like Claw & Quill, Dogpatch Press, or Flayrah.
Don’t forget Goodreads and Amazon, either
I put it on GoodReads and BookCrossing… didn’t think about the others.
Claw & Quill doesn’t ask for any review exclusivity (all work is Creative Commons licensed unless specified otherwise), so you can always do both!
The common wisdom is that reviews on sites that actually sell the books in question do the most to increase sales. Amazon’s recommendation engine is driven in part by how many reviews and ratings a book has. (Of course, one can argue that the value of reviews isn’t limited solely to how many sales they drive, and reviews at non-store sites are hard to quantify in that regard anyway. Someone who reads a review at C&Q may remember it the next time they pass by a publisher’s table at a con, or may throw it into a batch they’re buying on Amazon – or even just buy it later that day right at the publisher’s web site but without following the link from the review site. None of those sales can be matched to the review via simple analytics.)
On Goodreads at least, it’s possible to say ‘full review here’ and link to a longer review I’ve written elsewhere. Not sure about Amazon.
I finished Song of the Summer King – here’s the brief review I posted on Goodreads:
This is a nice, easy read about gryphons. Of course, that’s how I see it as an adult. If I’d read this when I was twelve, I would have loved it fiercely, created my own gryfon character of myself, and started writing my own stories about gryfons.
Currently working my way through the Ursa Major anthology. Thus far my thoughts aren’t particularly charitable. (Though, as usual, MCA Hogarth turned in a good piece.) I’m really hoping this anthology improves as I work my way through it.
As I recall, the last story in that anthology was excellent.
I have a soft spot for Beneath the Crystal Sea.
Considering all of the “Best of the Hugo Awards” and “Best of the Nebula Awards” anthologies there have been, one “Best of the Ursa Major Awards” isn’t too many. How long will it be until there are enough Cóyotl winners in the Short Fiction category for a “Best of the Cóyotl Awards” anthology?
I think we’re still a ways off.
Here’s the review I just posted to Goodreads of Inhuman Acts: A Collection of Noir:
[Disclaimer: I have a story in this anthology.]
Overall, this is a fairly enjoyable collection of stories filled with action and intrigue. It can get a little tropey – especially when it comes to the women characters who are mostly damsels in distress or evil seductresses (or gay and busy objectifying one of the evil seductresses). I found that hard to take. However, a number of the stories really use their furry settings in interesting ways – especially, “Muskrat Blues,” “Every Breath Closer,” and “Brooklyn Blackie and the Unappetizing Menu.” So, that’s really neat. My personal favorites from this collection, though, were “A Blacker Dog” and “Bullet Tooth Claw” – both very strong stories.
Thank you for the review!
Slightly off topic: Is it kosher to do a review of an anthology you’re in?
I don’t have a problem with it (as a writer or as a reader) as long as it’s mentioned, especially for the shorter, simpler types of reviews that are common to Amazon and Goodreads and other sales sites. For something longer and more in-depth like would be posted to Flayrah/Dogpatch/Claw & Quill, something that’s aiming more at literary criticism rather than a customer-type review, I can understand why it might seem a little strange.
I was planning on doing a review for Fang 6, which I am in. I just won’t talk about mine.
I think so, as long as you disclose it and recuse yourself from giving an opinion of it and/or exclude it from any overall statements on the anthology.