The Guardian and Total Sci-Fi Love Amortals

Amortals just received two more glowing reviews, one of which includes my favorite line from a review ever. First, though, Paul Simpson at Total Sci-Fi Online enjoyed the book and says:

Forbeck deftly deals with the philosophical implications of the society he’s functioning within while delivering a thrilling, chase-filled detective story with a surprising finale. VERDICT: 8/10 Highly enjoyable technothriller.

Wait for it. It gets even better. Over at The Guardian–yeah, that Guardian, one of the biggest newspapers in the UK–Eric Brown writes:

Amortals is Chandler by way of Blade Runner, with the pace of an express train. Great fun.

As a writer, I try not to think too much about reviews, but I read them all. Good or bad, I do my best not to take them to heart but to examine them with a cold eye to see what I can learn about my work from the reactions it engenders.

But this one just made my day. If I could have written my own review of Amortals, I would have wanted to come up with that exact line. Raymond Chandler is one of my favorite writers, and Blade Runner is one of my favorite films, and to have my work compared to either is an honor. The fact that this comes from my first review in a major paper–the second largest English-language newspaper on the web, behind only The New York Times–makes it that much sweeter.