Thanks to Bill L. for letting me know that my book is now on Slashdot Book Reviews. The reviewer, Mr. Michael Fiegel, does an excellent job covering the book's, well, coverage, and says that he finds it informative and entertaining. While he doesn't give the book a perfect score (again, the subject of the muddy screenshots rears its ugly head), he still recommends the book to anyone who likes fantasy and RPGs. On more personal notes, I recently received my first official fan email from a guy living in Greece, who says he loved the book because it brought back so many memories to him of playing these games as a teenager.

Overall, reviews of the book have been mostly positive, though I get some potshots from a few nasty but nevertheless prominent reviewers. I'd like to think they were negative because they disagreed with some of my controversial opinions, such as my distaste for Diablo, but I realize you simply can't please everyone. At any rate, I'm grateful to them for sharing their opinions along with the news about the book--otherwise, think of how many people wouldn't even know it existed! Still...to get at them with a Mace of Unending Malice +5 would still make my day. :)

I did get some numbers from the publisher as well. Apparently, the book is selling reasonably well and they are more than pleased with the sales. Of course, it's not a #1 hit or anything, but I think it's safe to say that there is now a proven market for this kind of thing even if it's not huge. Publishers tend to lose money on most of the books they publish, so even breaking even is considered a good thing (the best-sellers help balance the curve). Still, it'll probably take another six months or so to sell out the rest of the first printing, and believe you me, I'm going to be ADAMANTITE about the second printing and getting those typos and screenshots corrected. If any kind soul would like to help me put the screenshots on Flickr or some such please let me know.