Book Reviews and Where to Find Them

Novel-in-Progress Bookcamp & Writing Retreat, Inc. ~ Newsletter 15; August 2025

Aug 18, 2025

Greetings, Campers! Please pardon this ultra-late August issue of our monthly newsletter. Tell us what you think in the comments. This month we’re featuring Book Reviews and Where to Find Them, and more! The next newsletter issue comes out in September 2025. To feature your news and updates, please click here to fill out the form. Don’t worry, we won’t spam you.

In This Issue
A Note From the Director
Reviews and Where to Find Them
Poll: Do You Write Book Reviews?
Book Review: The Witch’s Apprentice and Other Stories
2025 Bookcamp Stories
CWA First Chapter Contest

Watch This Space for the 2026 Bookcamp Details…June 21st—27th, 2026!

A Note From the Director

We're busy planning for our 13th annual Novel Bookcamp, scheduled for the Siena Retreat Center in Racine on June 21-27, 2026. Announcements on pricing, staff, and schedule will be released in the next few months. Registration is open. Go to our website, novelbookcamp.org, for information, or email director@novelbookcamp.org with your questions.

Book Collection has New Home

Our Philip N. Martin Memorial Book Collection has moved. The collection is now housed in the office of Orange Hat Publishing/Ten16 Press. Michael Braun, owner and publisher, a member of the Novel Bookcamp Board of Directors, is providing the shelf space for the 200-plus book collection at 11803 W. North Ave. in Wauwatosa.

The collection was displayed in the library of the Cedar Valley Retreat Center since 2015.

Reviews and Where to Find Them

by Deborah L. King

As I neared my launch date, one of the assignments I received from my indie-press publisher was “Line up book reviewers.”

“Ok,” I thought, “Sounds easy enough… I’ll just ask everybody I know to write a book review, and they’ll ask their friends, and so on…”.

So I sat down and typed up a quick email, copied friends and family, and then attached an e-copy of my debut novel. They all said they’d definitely read and review my book. Then I put announcements on Facebook and Twitter sharing the good news and asking for more reviews.

And launch day came and it was fun… but the sound of online review crickets was deafening. My book launched with maybe 4 reviews on the first day, with a few more slowly trickling in over the following weeks. Conversations with other authors taught me that I’d not cast my net wide enough. My personal circle was not big enough to get the hundreds of reviews I was seeking, and besides… I was doing it all wrong anyway.

I’ll skip past the long boring drudgery to the part where I actually started receiving reviews. Here’s what I learned:

Don’t just send out ARCs all willy-nilly. Wait for a reviewer to agree to review your book before sending it.
Do read and understand a site’s review policies, and don’t violate them.
Do write a short query letter for contacting reviewers. You can skip the word count and bio and long introduction… just make sure your hook and synopsis are great.
Don’t CC or BCC or forward fifty reviewers on one query. Personalize each note with the reviewer’s name. Be sure to include a request for a review and an offer to send an ARC.
Do keep a list of reviewers you’ve queried. Allow at least four to six weeks before you nudge a reviewer. Free reviews are rarely fast. Fast reviews are rarely free.
Don’t query a reviewer more than once for the same book.

So… where does one find these elusive reviewers? Here’re a few good places to start. These list sites are free to join and have searches and filters so you can find reviewers and bloggers interested in your specific genre.

There are also paid review services and blog tour services that guarantee a couple or three reviews. If you choose to go this route, be sure to check where the reviews will be posted and to find out the policies on quotes and reposting.

And remember, querying reviewers is a long game. Don’t expect an avalanche of reviews overnight… but don’t get discouraged… the reviews will come.

How to Get Your Friends to Review Your Book

by Jennifer Rupp

Can’t get your friends to review your book? It might not be because they don’t care. It could be because they don’t know how, or they think it would take too much time. Make it easy for them!

Share these four easy steps:

One sentence describing what the book was about.
Ex. Reckless debutant falls for a rakish duke and gets more than she bargained for.
One sentence describing what you liked most about the book.
Ex. I loved the humor, the historic details, and the memorable characters.
One sentence saying whom you think will enjoy the book.
Ex. This book pairs well with a good glass of chardonnay and lovers of Regency Romance.
End with one last tag to encourage people to buy the book.
Ex. Grab a copy and feed your love of adventure.

Watch This Space for the 2026 Bookcamp Details…June 21st—27th, 2026!

BOOK REVIEW: The Witch’s Apprentice and Other Stories by Ekta Garg

Review by Jennifer Rupp

Novel Bookcamp alumna and board member Ekta Garg has just released a deliciously fun and wickedly clever adult spin on our favorite childhood stories. Rather than a retelling or a contemporary take, The Witch’s Apprentice and Other Stories answers questions like: What was the Wicked Witch of the East doing in Oz? and Who was Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother? It provides Jack and Jill’s backstory, because really, there has to be more than going up and hill and falling down. And (my favorite) a mashup of Sleeping Beauty and Goldilocks in which the real winner is the hapless lady-in-waiting. Consume them all at once or dish them out one morsel at a time, readers will love The Witch’s Apprentice and Other Stories because, as Ekta mentions in her acknowledgements, “it’s okay to focus on the small things.” Also, Ekta invites readers to contribute to her next micro-collection by suggesting their favorite nursery rhyme, fairy tale or classic story. Available on Ekta’s author website and other online venders.

Watch This Space for the 2026 Bookcamp Details…June 21st—27th, 2026!

A 2025 Bookcamp Adventure

by Scott Dineen

I rode with Frank out to the local lighthouse on the final night of Bookcamp. Frank ran over a raccoon and we thought he killed it (there was definitely a CLUNK ... CLUNK as the creature hit the front and back tires of Frank's car—followed by Frank's cry of anguish and regret ... followed by Frank's brief oral musings of whether he might need to get his car professionally cleaned to remove the fur). BUT [speaking in a mysterious whisper now] ... on our way back from the lighthouse an hour later, there was no sign of the raccoon on the road.

Odd. Suspicious, even.

What happened after the double CLUNK? Did the raccoon limp off into the woods? Did it perish, and another creature stumbled upon it and carried it off to consume privately? Or is the raccoon still out there, three-legged and one-eyed, biding its time, planning ... waiting for Frank's return? Waiting to exact its revenge for being so thoughtlessly CLUNKED aside on its innocent moonlit stroll? Only time will tell. Time ... and the 2026 Novel Bookcamp.

(PROMPT: Write the final confrontation between Frank and the raccoon. What happens when they encounter each other once more in the summer of 2026? Who survives ... and who expires at the hand—or paw—of the other? Bonus points for telling your story in the POV of the raccoon.)

Bookcamp Experience Story Contest

One of the fun things that happen at Bookcamp on Thursday evenings is the Bookcamp Experience Story Contest. Bookcampers get a chance to submit a 500-word story telling of their thoughts and adventures. The winner, chosen by applause, received a selection of thrillers about murders at a writing retreat! Over the next few newsletters, we’ll share a few of the stories. Please enjoy this noir entry!

Bookcamp Experience Story
The weather was so hot when I pulled into the place, I was surprised the tires of my Ford Fairlane didn’t melt into the asphalt. The air conditioning had gone out about 30 minutes earlier. All I had to keep me cool was the desert-like breeze from the rolled-down windows and the steady stream of sweat running down my spine.
I’m not sure why I decided to take this case, but here I was at the Siena Retreat Center instead of sitting in Eddie’s bar, yelling at the Brewers and downing a cold one. I didn’t even have a sip of warm water to wash away the saliva thickening in my mouth.
Glad to step out of my car, which was starting to smell like a high school boy’s locker room after basketball practice, I tried to inhale some fresh lake air, but the high humidity made it too thick to breathe. So, I hustled into the building, hoping their air conditioning was still working.
After checking in with the mastermind behind this event, Dave Rank he said his name was, I headed up to the third floor. Apparently, they all stayed here, tucked in simple, functional rooms that were still probably a step up from the austerity nuns lived in. But then they weren’t in this building.
The door was cracked open, and though the writer hadn’t been dead long, the stench of death crept through the threshold. If this were a cheap thriller movie, there’d be green smoke to show it.
I stepped in the room. And there she was. Head smashed against the monitor. Hands melted to the keyboard. A color-coded agenda drooped over the scribbled-in notebook sitting next to the laptop. On the floor lay a sweat-spotted manuscript with more colored flags than a 4^th of July parade, as dead as its author.
I should have expected this, when the call for a death at a writer’s retreat came in. Too much information, too many ideas, too little time. In the sweltering heat, it all melted together like crayons left in the hot sun.

Please share your 2025 camp stories & photos! Click here to fill out the form.

Watch This Space for the 2026 Bookcamp Details…June 21st—27th, 2026!

CWA's 10th Annual First Chapter Contest will open for entries on August 15th

Are you writing a novel? Submit the FIRST CHAPTER of your work, up to 10 pages, to CWA's 10th Annual First Chapter Contest.

First prize is a full scholarship to attend either the All-Genre Novel-In-Progress (NIP) Bookcamp & Writing Retreat or the Speculative Fiction NIP Bookcamp & Writing Retreat, both being held June 21-27, 2026, at the Siena Retreat Center in Racine, Wisconsin (value: $1740). Second and third place winners will receive cash awards of $150 and $75, respectively.

This opportunity is open only to dues-paying members of Chicago Writers Association. You may join CWA here.

Click here for contest details!

Watch This Space for the 2026 Bookcamp Details…June 21st—27th, 2026!