Upon coming across this site I am positive that you were filled with a burning desire to know what caused me to start this thing. And if not, leave me to my delusions.
I love reading science fiction and fantasy and have for years. The explosion of self-published books on Amazon as well as the launch of the Kindle Unlimited program have been a pleasure to explore. I read so much that for me, the problem to find a good book that I haven’t read became a struggle quite some time ago. Thus, my blogging adventure began.
Book Blog Problems
As I would browse book review websites I found many that covered professionally published books but very few that covered the self-published realm. The sites I could find seemed bloated with tons of posts about everything under the sun, except for posts about books, and had no simple list of self-published books I could browse through. Or if they did have a list it was full of books with covers populated by shirtless muscled men transforming into a werewolf/vampire with beefy arms around a woman while another half naked man off to the side who was also transforming into a werewolf/vampire was glaring at the couple. Or the design was so “artsy” with the tags/categories that it was extremely frustrating to navigate and blew my orderly accounting mind to a 404 error in trying to navigate it and find what I needed. The other issue I found is that often book review sites are edited by authors, or people that love words, and the posts are waaaay too long for me. I want to browse a list of books and then make up my own mind about what to read, not read a novel, about what novel I should be reading.
Now, some people have an issue with the editing problems, or other issues, that are pretty common in self-published works. Going into the genre knowing they are going to be present helps me just shrug them off and continue on my through the story. I am there for the story, for the author’s worldbuilding that their words and my imagination will bring to life, and as long as the story inconsistencies and other errors don’t jar me out of that we’re good. If you go into it with the same mindset I think you will have a much better time, than if you go in expecting to read the next Name of the Wind. Besides that there are some self-published books that are great stories, that are well edited, but that would probably never have been published simply because they would have been too hard to market for a traditional publisher.
The Start
From this pain Mr. Book-Stash (MBS) was born, so that in the future people like me will have a place filled with glorious book lists, in a variety of genres, filled with novels that you won’t typically find in your public library. Blog posts will consist of some stats for the book, a brief description, and an even briefer blurb from me posted weekly about self-published books I find, with a sprinkling of professionally published novels mixed in.
The Book List menu option at the top of the site has lists for a variety of scifi/fantasy genres you can browse through to your hearts content, with an associate link to Amazon (click the book cover picture). You may not like all the books I say you should read, but I can guarantee that there will be something in there you will enjoy.
I am always looking for something to read so if you would like me to read your novel or have a review requests send me an e-mail at mbstashreviews@gmail.com