Well with all the publicity he's getting, I just hope he is consistent, that way his loyal fans can enjoy his unique genre.. we may have a new genre "Dylan S" or "DS" for short
True, and I think it's a mark of human civilization that we're able to restrain our inner-chimp, especially when all we want to do is screech, beat the wall and fling our own poo at people who've offended/anger us. This guy...did not restrain his inner-chimp.
He did worse than that. He tapped the instinctual buttons that bring out the inner chimp in others. We all know these buttons at a limbic level. We know what will make the troupe hoot and holler, pull up saplings and stamp around the communal area bearing their teeth in a wide grimace. Every single last person in this thread who read his initial response kept reading because we all knew exactly what was coming. We're programmed to know it. We all continued reading - me included, have no doubt - because every once in a while we need to give that little chimp a chance to breathe outside of the curtain behind which we normally hide him/her. I don't hate this dude. I don't even know him. I think he's actually kinda' interesting as a study/scaffold for a character. I mean, This Guy (the archetype), in his many guises, has visited our forum. We've all met him/her on several different occasions. The failed messiah. The successful martyr (in his/her religion of one). He/She exists as one of the kinds of people we can expect to meet on the journey of life. ETA: Please, no one take this as an opportunity to start naming names. I will delete such posts. Fair warning.
And he has, in fact, published 2 novels, with quite interesting covers, and had reviews on said novels. Despite the delusions, and lack of perceived quality, that's a pretty fair effort.
I want to find a Sentiment Analysis and Text Analytics for Social Media application, I sure our robot overlords have developed something, how about giving us humans a go at it... edit or may be this is a publicity stunt for a company making such software.
Truth be told, I was half-tempted to go give that Dylan dude a 1 star rating for his behaviour myself, but looks like the work has been done for me and I need not tarnish my own reputation I love this person's comment to Dylan - made me laugh: Dylan actually offered his first page in the comments - here it is, a snippet of what he quoted: How anyone managed to finish his book and even rate it 4 stars, I'll never know. Wonder if the positive reviews are fake? I love it when you get these authors who are convinced their work is gonna be the thing that rescues humanity. Like, seriously? Oh the self-importance.
Is this thread still going? I actually read a few pages of the preview of the guys novel. It wasn't really my kind of thing, but I can't see why someone would pan it. Maybe I just didn't read enough. As for the writing, some of his descriptive text was nice, but the flow buckled at times. It seemed a lot like a series of actions as well. Just some mystery hooded dude laying down an ass whooping in the shape of fire balls. Overall, it seemed like prose for teenagers with a boner for Warcraft fan fiction. The type of stuff Philip Roth wipes his ass with.
Overall -- really creepy and kinda sad. Although I didn't like the writer's attitude and the way he responded - this sent a chill down my spine - It's like a blacklist. Now, I know he sort of had it coming to him, but what if, when people don't have it coming to them? Scary. Just goes to show all writers - watch your words!
I remember once there was an author who got a 1 star rating on her book that hasn't even been published yet - she was ready to publish it but it wasn't yet available. So the reviewer can't have read the book, and gave it a bad rating anyway. I don't quite remember how but it escalated and goodreads members started targetting her and gave her tonnes and tonnes bad reviews and basically attacking her in the comments, to the point where the girl released a blog post informing her readers that she will no longer publish that book after the harrassment she got
How horrible. I wonder if anyone felt bad for what they did? I suppose it wouldn't matter the damage was already done.
I'm not scared of whackjobs like this guy. I'm content with people telling me my writing is crap, because i already see it as average or below avrage anyways.
How to Pulitzer: 1. Write about a handicapped person in occupied France. 2. Call it something like "A Grace of Sorrow" 3. Win Pulitzers.
Oh my God, this is so beautiful! Writeitwriteitwritewritewritewrite!!! You could maybe have the person be a small child who is orphaned because his parents were taken by the Nazis and he lives with his evil aunt and uncle who secretly sympathizes with the Nazis and only keeps him because he provides good work. But it's through his inspirational disability that they get a change of heart and defend him from the Nazi scum that approaches their doorstep asking for 'the invalid scum'. Oh God, this is worth a movie!!!! Morgan Freeman, Kiera Knightly, Orlando Bloom, Bruno (aka, that guy from Downfall), um...some random child actor! Oh, and how is he disabled? Uh, blindness! Yeah, he's blind but he's pure of heart and doesn't 'see' the difference between one human or another. "They're all the same, no matter what," he says near the climax. A Grace of Sorrow, coming to a theatre near you Winter 2039. "You will cry big tears." - IBM Studios. "This makes Titanic look like Disneyworld." - Random McFamous Director. "This movie is breaking my heart! It's going down a path I can't follow!" - Padme Amidala. ... I'll be leaving now.
Oh my, yes!! She's a teen, and also meets a hot German boy named Gustov who is torn because his father is a Nazi supporter, his brother was forced to fight for the Nazis, but his mother and grandma don't like them at all but are forced into silence by fear. But the title demands sorrow and tragedy so at the very end, Gustov fights the Nazi and dies of a bullet wound while being cradled and sobbed on by her. It'll revolutionize literature as we know it!!!! But seriously, stuff like this had always made me hesitate getting an account at GoodReads to review books because what if an author didn't like my review and did what that guy did?
I think this guy is a good example of why only flowing writing is not the only factor in writing a good novel. For example: Spoiler: Quote ^I find this paragraph to be well written and a joy to read. However as I said flowery language is not a decider of the book's quality. It needs to be entertaining, with compelling characters, realistic dialogue and suspense filled plot. Writing is the only median where the individual creator has full and fair control over these. Instead the writer has filled his novel with uninteresting backstory and tiresome symbolism.
Uuhhhhhhhh different person, worse scenario... http://www.dailydot.com/entertainment/author-stalks-goodreads-troll/
These authors who lash out at reviewers, and the people who rate their books 1 star to make a point, are guilty of the same thing: abusing a platform. No matter how important you think it is to make your point, whether you are an author and your point is that a reviewer is a big meanie pants, or you are a reviewer and your point is that the author does not deserve your money, the review section for a book is the wrong place to make that point. The review section is a place to talk about one thing, and one thing only: the content of the book itself.
If I received a one-star review.... I believe there is quite a fantastic quote from Cloud Atlas that basically points to "just shrug it off": "What is a critic but one who reads quickly, arrogantly, but never wisely?" Seriously. A one star review is one of three things: One, the critic hates that genre outright (see: Any review for the band Rush). Two, the critic saw a place where you could improve, and you can take or leave the advice. Three, the critic genuinely hates the work, so seriously, move on, because you're not making any friends or progress by sitting there and arguing your case. Chew on it or spit it out, no one is forcing you to be different than who you are. Either way, move on with life, and don't let the critics get you down.
