Submission Guidelines

Send an email to us at casefulofclues@gmail.com. Provide a cover letter, and include your blurb/synopsis (no spoilers, though!), cover art, and release date, especially if you'd like the review in time for your book launch. Submission is free. We prefer books submitted in .mobi or .epub format (which saves you postage!). We prioritize reviewing mysteries and thrillers from independent authors, but please make sure your novel is professional-quality before submitting.

As our name might suggest, we love reading good mysteries. Traditional detectives, hard-boiled mysteries, noir, and police procedurals are all accepted. We accept steampunk mysteries, historical mysteries, and the occasional cozy. We'll also accept some action-adventure, psychological thrillers, literary fiction, and contemporary and historical fiction. Elements of mystery in the books increase your chances of review (and make sure you include that in your cover letter). We do not review horror, sci-fi, fantasy, paranormal, or romance.

With the number of books submitted, we can't guarantee that we can review every book submitted, and we reserve the right to reject a book for review if it doesn't meet quality standards or if it's too far outside of the preferred genres.

While we prioritize independent authors (Paul is one himself), we know indies have the reputation for being unprofessional, especially with editing, grammar, and poor layout and cover design. If you submit, please make sure your book is equal in quality to the traditionally published books in the mystery genre. A few typos are to be expected; a few typos per page are definitely not.

If you'd like to use an excerpt of a Caseful of Clues review in an ad, back-of-print-book, editorial review on a book retailer site, or something similar, you may use anything in the review; use the complete sentence, and don't change any words, please attribute the reviewer's name, followed by "Caseful of Clues Reviews".

Please let us know that you're using the excerpt from our review by sending an e-mail to casefulofclues@gmail.com.

If you'd like to use an excerpt of a review, but need it slightly modified (sentence structure, fitting it into an ad, etc.), send an e-mail to casefulofclues@gmail.com and we'll be happy to work with you to provide you what you need.

If you'd like to review mysteries or thrillers for Caseful of Clues, please send a cover letter and a sample review of a mystery or thriller to casefulofclues@gmail.com. We regret that we cannot pay reviewers at this time.