About Books

  • ·

    4 stars, baby!

    10 Comments

    karma-girl-cover.jpg

    Karma Girl just got reviewed in the May issue of Romantic Times … and got a 4-star rating! Who-hoo! (The highest rating the magazine gives is 4 1/2 stars).

    Here’s what Jill M. Smith, the reviewer, said:

    Secret identities and superpowers take on a delightful and humorous new twist in Estep’s exciting debut, written in the first person. Fun and sexy, Estep’s caper demonstrates how revenge can backfire. Here’s hoping for more Bigtime adventures from this impressive talent.

    Wow! She liked it! Three sentences’ worth of like!

    Needless to say, I’m having an excellent day. 😎

  • It’ll change your life … or not …

    4 Comments

    There are exactly 35 days to go until Karma Girl hits store shelves. Not that I’m counting down or anything. 😀

    One of my co-workers who’s also an author (he writes non-fiction travel books) recently made a prophecy. “When that book comes out,” he said. “It’ll change your life.”

    And I had to wonder … will it? Will it really?

    Because I’ll still be me. Anal-retentive. Obsessive. Compulsive. Slightly crazy. A total fangirl. I’ll still get up and go to my day job every morning. Still have bills to pay. Still hang out with my friends and family.

    What’s going to change? I doubt very much that people are suddenly going to stop me on the street, shake my hand, and gush about how great my book is. (Although that would be awesome!) Oh, I imagine I’ll get a little more name recognition at RWA events and the like, but that’s about it. I hope I get some reader e-mails telling me that they enjoyed the book. Maybe even some from other authors that I read and like. But what else is going to happen? What’s going to change?

    I can’t imagine — but I hope I’m pleasantly surprised by the outcome. 😎

    What about you? Has having a book published changed your life? How? Inquiring minds want to know …

  • ·

    An ideal book?

    2 Comments

    So, I’m surfing some of the romance blogs I frequent, and I came across this post over at Magical Musings talking about what makes an ideal book — complete with the cover for Karma Girl.

    I sent an ARC of the book to Edie Ramer, one of the MM bloggers, and she wrote me back to tell me how much she liked it. But putting it with a blog about the ideal book? Wow. That’s a tremendous compliment.

    I got a good review in Publishers Weekly and some kick-ass cover blurbs from other authors, like MaryJanice Davidson and Erin McCarthy. But I’m most anxious to see what readers think about Karma Girl. Will they like it? Love it? Hate it? Think it’s the worst thing that’s ever gotten published?

    I know I’m going to get some bad reviews. Every author does (unless you’re J.R. Ward who seems to get universal acclaim). But one person liked my book — enough to recommend it to other people. That makes me smile. Makes me feel proud. Makes me feel downright giddy. It’s the reason I wrote Karma Girl in the first place – to entertain someone with my wacky world of superheroes and villains. 

    So, even if every other reviewer in the known universe rips me a new one for writing such drivel, I know I made at least one person happy. And the glow from that won’t fade for a long, long time.

    How do you cope while you wait for the reader reviews to come in? Inquiring minds want to know …

  • The whole shebang …

    2 Comments

    My Publishers Weekly review for Karma Girl has been posted to Amazon.com, so I guess I can put the whole thing up here too. This is what they wrote in its entirety:

    Chick lit meets comics lit in Estep’s fresh debut. Carmen Cole, “reporter extraordinaire” for the Exposé in Bigtime, N.Y., is on a mission — to unmask all superheroes and über villains — after catching her fiancé, Matt Marion (aka the Machinator), in bed with her best friend, Karen Crush (aka Crusher), on Carmen’s wedding day.

    But after Carmen outs a member of the Fearless Five, Travis Teague (aka Tornado), and Travis kills himself, she’s not only devastated, she’s demoted to society reporter. When the Terrible Triad nabs Carmen, their snarky Malefica insists she unmask the Fearless Five’s Striker or suffer dire consequences.

    By the time Carmen knows who Striker is, they’re in love, and turning him over to a superbitch isn’t an option. A zippy prose style helps lift this zany caper far above the usual run of paranormal romances. (May) 
    Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

    I know it’s mostly plot summary, but this still makes me insanely happy. Two whole sentences of like isn’t too shabby for a newbie like me. 😀

  • ·

    Publishers Weekly review time …

    17 Comments

    karma-girl-cover.jpgOMG! Karma Girl got reviewed in Publishers Weekly! And they liked it!

    Who-hoo!

    Here’s some of what they said: 

    Chick lit meets comics lit in Estep’s fresh debut … A zippy prose style helps lift this zany caper far above the usual run of paranormal romances.

    I can’t believe they liked it! I can’t quit typing in exclamation points!

    Who-hoo!