encouragement and critiques

I have been a fan of yours for a while now. When I came across the free download for the “Dwellers of the Night” trilogy, I was overwhelmed. I finished the first two books in no time at all, and now I am waiting as patiently as possible for Book Three. When will the trilogy be completed? Why is the main character referred to as ‘the man’? Are you going to reveal the cause of the outbreak in the last installment? Why don’t you have these books produced in theaters? I am looking forward to hearing back from you. EXCELLENT WORK! I LOVE YOUR BOOKS!!!! Truly a fan, Rashae.

I received that email several days ago. It is always encouraging to hear that someone is reading my work and enjoying it. Currently I have around 8000 readers, and I receive emails often telling me good job, but I love it when readers ask questions and seek understanding regarding the book. It is great to get feedback, no matter if it is good or bad (I’ve received both). One day I may post some of the negative reviews I’ve gotten. As a writer, I am overly critical of my own work, so hearing from someone detached from me personally is encouraging. It is easy for friends or family to say, “Good job,” even when they don’t actually believe it themselves. To prevent myself from getting prideful, here are some negative views I’ve gotten:

It's a familiar plot: Some previously unknown disease kills a few people (let's call it Zombyitis). Of course the dead quickly reanimate as zombies and kill others making more and more zombies and within a short time, the whole world is made up of zombies. This tired old plot then focuses on the few survivors and their struggles against the zombie population. It seems like Zombie fiction writers can't deviate too far from this storyline. And unfortunately, Anthony Barnhart brings nothing new to the zombie table with '36 Hours'. It's the same tired old story, different town, a few different twists. 36 Hours is nothing but scene after scene of zombie pandemonium. There are very few interludes and transitions to smoothen out the story. Good writers use interludes and transitions to develop sub plots and develop their characters, thus strengthening their story. The few weak transitions and lame interludes in this book fall limp however and don't do anything for the story. The primary characters are teenagers and the character development is appropriately sophomoric. You never get to know them and things they do and say seem awkward and contrived in the context of this horrible book. Fortunately, it's free for the download, but I would be unhappy if I paid $11 for this. This is just yet another Zombie mess - Avoid it unless you are very easily entertained.

Is this thing really published? This looks like a story my 12 year old son would write.....If my 12 year old was high on Crack, Drunk and Retarded. This thing is so poorly written that you cannot help but continue to stare at this train wreck of a story and gasp in horror as the dialog goes from asinine to insane. You will cringe with pain as you continue to read each page just to see how if it can possibly get any worse- It can. Concerning Character depth and development, all I have to say is that you will find more depth and personality in Al Gore than you will in the pages of this...this....thing that is supposed to be a novel. All I have to say about this one is......Really, really, really BAD.

I'm not going to be too disparaging here, but I am shocked this was published in print. The grammar was atrocious, the character development was awful to non-existent and the "action" was so ham-handed and repetitive that I found myself blanking out and skimming whole pages of text.

In all honesty, these were regarding a book I wrote five years ago. My writing style has totally changed, and I have not received any bad reviews on “Dwellers of the Night” at this point in time. Also, for each negative review I received, I received at least three positive reviews. So I can't feel TOO awful, haha. It is sometimes difficult to read bad reviews, especially when the reviewers spend more time attacking the author than attacking the literary features of the story, but on the flip-side, these reviews have helped me hone my talent and really develop as a writer. I didn’t include some other negative reviews I received, because it turned out that those giving the reviews were just trying to lure people into reading their own work, which is too shady for me to even pay attention to.