funnystrange.com

We've gotten our first negative review of VTW. To my knowledge, of course. In a way I'm relieved. I have been anticipating the dreaded negative review for a long time, wondering what they would say and how I would feel. Would I be hurt? Would I be angry? Would I take to bed and pull the covers over my head for a week? What if they were right? Would I feel like a talentless hack?

As it turns out I'm not upset about it, which is a relief. (And a pleasant surprise, considering my tendency to over-analyze and worry things to death.) Some of his criticisms are warranted, I think; some are arguable; and some I disagree with completely, including a couple of inaccuracies about the deck. However, I am not -- not! -- going to commit the big author mistake and argue with a review. Instead I will simply thank him from afar, for reminding me that I'm not all that.

Okay, well if I'm being all noble about it, I ought to be honest too. So I will confess that one line in the review does irk me: a statement that the project might have accomplished more if we were British instead of American. It's kind of funny because I have received positive letters from people who don't believe I'm American, they think only a Brit could have created the VTW art. Either way -- whether complimenting me by calling me British, or deriding me for being American -- I do not get it at all.

But whatever! I can't change who I am. If having been born in the US makes me less qualified to write or do art in the milieu of Victorian Britain, well there's not much to done about that. If "but you're not British" is the worst criticism of VTW, I think we're doing pretty well.