Shoes, reviews and having the blues...

I got my first negative review on Amazon this week, or should I say I got my first three (and counting) bad reviews on Amazon this week.

There were several criticisms labelled at Rainy Days and Tuesdays and indeed at me as a writer.

The first is that I'm trying too hard to be like Marian Keyes. Now looking at the title of this post, you may see that I am in ways influenced by her style of writing but simply as when I first lifted an MK book I thought "Ah finally! Someone finally gets me!"
But I don't think I'm trying to be her. First of all when they made queen Mazza they broke the mould. She reinvented the genre and she did (and does) a damn good job of it.
I'm just trying to be me and people can like me, hate me, feeling "meh" about me, if they wish.
Another criticism said the book read like an autobiography. Well, as it absolutely is not an autobiography I actually take that as a compliment. It must mean that someone out there thinks it reads as a honest account of someone's life. It is a work of fiction but if even one person thinks it feels real then as a writer I'm doing my job properly.

Someone also said mum lit was on the way out.... I really, really don't think so!

But I would be lying if I didn't say the reviews smarted a little, but it is all part of this glorious business we call publishing. I knew when I wrote the book that some people would like it, and some people would hate it. Some people would toss it aside and some would read it time and time again. I believe in it as a book and in me as a writer.
(And as for the shoes part of the heading, I'm on the look out for new boots, so if anyone sees anything nice floating about let me know!)