<h3 align="center">Reviews</h3>

If you take a copy of Dan Brown's The DaVinci Code and open it up the first thing that will strike you is the pages and pages of glowing reviews. Under each review you will see the names of famous papers, professionals, all of which gives the reader a warm feeling of reassurance, that they have made a good investment in buying this book. When you buy a car you get second opinions, so it is only natural to do the same with a book. So positive reviews are a must if you are to get people to read your book. But how do you go about this?

At the moment I am trying to get people to review my book. So far the only people who have read the book are family and friends and as much as I love them and respect their opinions it looks a bit dubious if you see a book with a glowing review, written by the author's mother or old primary school teacher. This means that your book has to venture out. You have to lay it at the mercy of reviewers and see what they make of it.

So far I have given the book to almost ten people and am currently waiting feedback. Will it be positive? Will they slate the book? I have no idea and I have no control. They could absolutely despise the book or they could love it. I can see why authors really start to sweat at this stage. You spend so long putting the book together, you have almost absolute control and then at a certain point you have to let go completely. Imagine a man hanging from a cliff. A voice below tells him to let go and he will be caught before he hits the rocks below. It seems madness to let go but what else can he do. He cannot climb back up. This gives some sort of idea of how an author might feel having just sent his/her book out into the world. Will something wonderful happen, or will it be ripped apart. The author has no real way of knowing.

But while the author has no control over what the reviewer thinks, he/she can control how they respond to this review and in both extreme cases there are dangers. If the review is excellent does he/she get carried away and believe he/she is now suddenly something special. Or if the review is terrible does he/she feel crushed and demoralised. If you approach a reviewer with expectations other than to receive an honest review you will be disappointed. If your book needs work, then for the sake of your book you need to know. If your book is excellent then likewise you need to know.

Either way, having the courage to offer yourself to be criticised by a complete stranger is something to be proud of. The key thing to remember is that the review can only help. In other words it can only be good. If the review is excellent it could help sell the book. If the review points out some flaws that you missed, then put pride aside, and use those points to improve your book. And if you get thrashed, difficult as it may be, there could be a great lesson to learn. In my experience rejection can offer more of a chance to shine than acceptance.