I never read book reviews for the simple reason that I don’t care enough about the reviewer to know that much about them. This isn’t really fair because there’s a whole spectrum of reviewers with invisible reviewers at one end and can’t-see-the-book-for-the-reviewer reviewers at the other end. Invisible reviewers are good in terms of actually learning something useful about the book, but their lack of personality (or appearance thereof) means that no one wants to print what they have to say. The other kind of reviewer jumps all over the page like a hyperactive kitten — endearing perhaps, but hyperactive kittens never understand that you actually want to read the book it’s sitting on.

I won’t be doing any kind of reviewing here. I started typing a review last night (my thoughts on pages one to two of a Tom Holt book I browsed) but I ended up saying far more about my own writing/reading preferences than the actual book. Under those circumstances the book is actually redundant and I don’t need to mention it at all. I may end up reiterating my comment, but I won’t pretend to be saying anything about that book in specific.