How to Leave a Review

And Maybe Win a Book!

First and foremost, this is not a way to incentivise readers to leave good reviews. This is a way to incentivise a high volume of honest reviews, from everyone who's read my stories and enjoyed them. Everyone who leaves a review, sticks to some simple guidelines (that aren't meant to influence the rating) and fills in the appropriate form will be eligible to win a signed copy of my book, no matter how critical the review in question. 

Chances are if you didn't like it, you might not be so keen to win a signed copy anyway.  Honestly, I'm not even sure what I'd put in the dedication for a signed copy for someone who gets harsh about my book - but we'll work it out, if it happens. 😁

I will be using a random number generator to pick the winner, so I won't be out to punish those who are critical, or immediately reward those who praise me. Bear in mind that I do have thick skin, and there's a chance I'll find a very nasty review funny - and celebrate it. So anything goes. Almost.

Because I do have some guidelines I'm going to require for eligibility, both because certain Goodreads processes need to be adhered to, and because I want these reviews to sell books. You can still break these guidelines and leave a review, I guess, but I won't feel obliged to let you be a part of the giveaway if you do. 

So here they are:

Guidelines:

• Don't mention that you read it on Nifty, Literotica or Radish. Please merely say that you read an 'early version.' I still want my stories to be available for free, and plan to leave them up on these platforms for as long as is practical. Amazon (who owns Goodreads) will occasionally do price-matching, meaning that if they can easily find these sites, they might force me to set my books value to be $0 on there. At which point I might have to remove them if I want to be able to charge for my book, which will be a difficult and unpleasant choice that I'd hate to make.

• Don't talk about the giveaway. Hopefully it's clear that I'm not trying to force five-star ratings out of people (Please tell me first if you think this is a bit of an issue, rather than reporting me) but I really don't have time to be reported on Goodreads for that and deal with the issues there, so I would appreciate it if you don't say things like "Please let me win!". Keep it secret, keep it safe.

• Don't engage in abusive behaviour towards any people or groups, or get overly moralistic about consensual sex. Homophobia, biphobia, misogyny and slut-shaming are the things I'm possibly anticipating. But if you engage in that, or any bigoted or otherwise unpleasant behaviour, my books are not for you, and you will not win anything.

That's it! Three guidelines - I really don't think that's too much to ask. But we'll see how it goes. Now, on to the process:

How to Enter:

1. Leave your review on Goodreads page for One More Year. (Remember to follow the Guidelines!)
2. Fill in the Eligibility Form. Try to do this right after you post the review, just in the unlikely case that someone else tries to claim your hard work.
3. Sit back, and wait for your prize! The winner(s) will be notified via email once the book is finalised (hopefully sometime before June 13) and shipment of signed copies will be arranged.

The working assumption is that there will be one signed physical copy available for this giveaway, although I plan to increase that (budget permitting) to keep the chances of winning a book between 1-in-10 and 1-in-20 - so, for example, if I get up to 30 reviews, I might add another book, and then possibly yet another for each 20 reviews thereafter. I'm doubtful it'll get that high, and I make no promises, but that's my intention at this moment.

(Ignore the image, I just needed a quick visual reference 

for my dashboard, and I was feeling cheeky. 😉)