Publisher press release:

Melissa McPhail’s new book, Cephrael’s Hand marks her debut as a fantasy writer. Every so often a writer incorporates all of the successful elements that reader’s demand: a good plot (yet not too predictable), characters that are complex and intriguing, a good mix of humor with action, and enough twists to keep you guessing. These characteristics will make Cephrael’s Hand a tough book to put down.

McPhail’s visual writing style and engaging storytelling quickly draws the reader in as we are introduced to several compelling characters. She builds tension early in the story, and her ability to bring real life and heart to her characters makes it easy to genuinely care about them. Interestingly, the story of Cephrael’s Hand is not one sided—with the “good guys” being objectively good and the “bad guys” being intrinsically evil. Instead, McPhail artfully presents the viewpoint of both sides, and we are left feeling that each may have a moral point to their own actions. The exploration of each character’s thoughts, motivations and frustrations are fully presented. McPhail crafts her tale without revealing too much and accordingly maintains a high level of interest and intrigue for the reader.

McPhail’s research into ancient cultures, weapons and fighting styles present clearly in this book. Without pages of unnecessary detail, enough information is given to establish credibility to the extraordinary aspects of Alorin, its creatures and the magic system presented within. The dialogue is insightful, intelligent and at times wonderfully humorous. We find ourselves laughing out loud at banter between characters and on the edge of tears from heart-tugging events.

Cephrael’s Hand is a captivating and entertaining novel and one that has me anxiously waiting for the next book in the series. I urge you to pick up the book and read through the first chapter; you’ll be hooked.

For more information, visit the author’s Cephrael Hand website.

Please Note: This guest post does not necessarily reflect the opinions of www.bestfantasybooks.com

Paul Hoffman’s The Left Hand of God is a new book that’s been garnering mixed reviews. Some people absolutely love it, some are lukewarm about it, and some despise it.

I liked it and quite a lot actually. It’s a rough gem, but in my opinion, still a gem.

So what’s so good about this book, in a genre where there is a lot of good fantasy books.

So let’s get to a bit of the plot.

The world explored in The Left Hand of God is a pretty damn dark one. Cale, the protagonist, starts life out in a monastery. But this isn’t your normal fantasy monastery. The monks, you see, don’t worship love, hope, peace, and all that stuff, but worship (and relish) pain. And Cale, as an acolyte of this order, basically endures a life of pain and physical torture. Not exactly an appealing place to grow up.

But Cale’s destiny turns out to be more than just the whipping boy for a bunch of sadistic monks.  Those who like reading about a baass hero (and don’t we all?) will find Cale interesting indeed.

The Bad

Now this is Hoffman’s first book and there are some flaws. The plotting is a bit uneven and the protagonist Cale occasionally vacillates between being a super badass with no fear with always a couple aces up his sleeve to a trembling whiny kid with a bad case of emoism at certain points in the novel – something that will make you just want to reach into the book and give the kid a couple hard slaps.  Sometimes you get the feeling the author simply throws in some of the plot conventions just because he was told that “a good fantasy book should have them.” This makes them feel forced rather than natural.

The author tries to inject a pseudo real-history/religion into the novel – it’s set in a sort of standard fantasy middle ages with the usual fantastical religions, but the author bizarrely tosses in a few references to Jesus Christ and Jews out of the blue.

The Good

The setting is pretty interesting. Cale’s childhood is pretty vicious and the author really pulls you into this disturbing world. As soon as you start reading, you get sucked into Cale’s life. The author doesn’t just throw out all the details about who the protagonist is, but gradually doles Cale’s life…and abilities slowly. It’s a nice build up – something that reminded me the way The Warded Man was set up. The action, when it happens, is fast, vicious, and glorious.

This book is…different. It’s not your standard fantasy novel that publishers churn out like a butcher churns out ground beef. Ok, bad analogy, but it stand out. The plot buildup, the visceral action sprinkled throughout the book, and the twists and turns that take place make it a very enticing read. You won’t be bored.

If you like the intensity, plot, and action of books like The Warded Man or the adventure present in The Name of the Wind, you certainly won’t be disappointed with the Left Hand of God. Those who don’t like violence, death, and torture might want to give this book a skip, but if you relish action, adventure, heroism, romance, and a dark tone, this books is for you.  Just don’t start reading before you go to bed – you won’t end up sleeping.

I thought, hot on the heels of my last Advanced Book Review Copies(ARC’s) Expose, I would offer a few suggestions for you small publishers and self published authors — since I’ve been getting some emails asking for some advice about this. Here is my .02 for how small publishers can get more book sales and quality book reviews.

1. High Quality Cover Art
You know the saying “don’t judge a fantasy book by its cover.” Well, the saying, unfortunately, is very true when it comes to books, especially books not published by established publisher. If your book cover looks like something my 12-year old nephew whipped up in a couple hours with some free image editing software, you may find that getting book reviews (and readers!) a difficult.

Humans are shallow creatures. We tend to judge things, be it people, music, and books by our surface impressions. Yes, in an ideal world a person would, for the sheer love of literature, ignore the book cover. Unfortunately, that world doesn’t exist. I understand for you self-published authors and small publishers, budget is a big deal. But upping your budget for quality, professional cover art may be one of the best ways to promote your books effectively.

2. Ensure you have a Professional Looking Website
The first thing many book reviewers (and some readers) do upon receiving a book review request, is to look at the publisher’s website. If the website looks shoddy, said review will likely reject the book review offer, or if he or she does receive the book, place a very low priority on actually getting around to read and review the book.

Your website is your virtual office. Think of it this way: if you have important clients who you are trying to sell some idea or product to, would you bring them into an office building with cracks all over the wall and paper strewn about the rooms? I don’t think so. People will judge the quality of your company and people by the way your website looks. Sad, yes, but very true.

Again, I realize that some people have crappy websites because they don’t have the funds to hire a professional. But sometimes it takes money to make money, and your website is the FIRST thing you should be spending money on. Scope out major publishing companies’ websites for inspiration. But the bottom line: your website should look good. I can’t tell you how many small publisher websites I’ve gone to only to reel back with horror at how bad the web design actually is.

Web designers are cheap these days. You can probably get a very professional fantasy book publishing website done for fewer than 5k, maybe much less if you shop around. A good looking website may also attract more talented authors to pursue your publishing services as well.

3. Print Your Books on Paper
There is a pretty big stigma associated with online-only publishers. Besides having to destroy our eyes while reading that massive honking PDF on our monitor screens (unless we have an Amazon Kindle), online-only publishers lack an air of legitimacy. To me, the line between a vanity publisher and online-only publisher is thin indeed. What gives publisher legitimacy? An army of qualified editors and copy editors. Online publishers don’t tend to have to much in the way of an “editing” process for their books. Which takes me to my next point.

4. Have Good and Qualified Editors
A good editor will make or break your book. Now like everything else, this is probably one of the more expensive personal investments to make, but a good book without good editing is bad. My experience with small publishers is that the editing is not very good and there are a lot of errors with grammar and punctuation – a very big turnoff for any potential reader. Part of the success of established publishers is their strong team of talented editors. So, if you are a mom and pop publishing operation, please throw down the cash to get someone who’s actually qualified to edit your books. Just because you got an A in grade 11 lit class does NOT mean you are qualified to edit a novel.

5. Publish Books with Unique Stories
It goes without saying (but I’m going to say it anyways), you should only publish good books. In the fantasy genre, there are more “village boy Joe finds a magic sword, becomes a great hero and slays dark lord” type plots than you can shake a book at. I may be willing to suffer through yet another cliché plot if the book is backed by a major publisher – but certainly not a self published author or a unknown small publisher. Publish books that do something original with the genre. If the plot sounds interesting and UNIQUE, the potential reviewer will be more likely to pick the book up and say some nice things about it that may just encourange peopel to buy the book. If you are going to go the Robert Jordan clone route, you’re going to lose big time; the established publishers have the monopoly on this type of fantasy story.

There we go, 5 suggestions to help you small publishers sell more books and get more book reviews.