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The subject this week is reviews, with a subtitle drawn from
some children’s rhyme I never even heard of and which sounded unpleasant and
disrespectful to reviewers.
A review is that reader’s experience with the book. They bought the book (or agreed to accept an ARC) so they're entitled to their opinion.
I wrote my book, I told the story I wanted to tell,
obviously I was content with it or I wouldn’t have pushed the ‘publish button’
on the ebook seller sites. I've moved on to my next book.
I appreciate people taking the time and energy to write
reviews. I think in many cases the reviews can be helpful to other readers in
deciding whether to try a book. They may love or hate some trope the first
reviewer loved or hated. They may want to see what the 5 stars or the 1 star is
all about. They may want to suss out if there’s a cliffhanger or a trigger. (I
never write cliffhangers!!! Hopefully I don’t do triggers either.) Some reviews
may be for a product totally unrelated to my book which somehow ended up attached
to my book through the mysteries of ebook seller platforms. Some authors have
been unfortunate in that a troll or an author who views everyone else as a
rival has sent out his/her legions of fans to leave terrible reviews on their
books.
I think the vast majority of reviewers - and especially the devoted book bloggers! - try very hard to give their honest opinion and feedback.
I don’t spend much if any time pondering reviews.
I don’t review books either except for one specific
exception. Well ok, two.
When I wrote for the old Heroes & Heartbreakers blog,
they wanted me to identify a few “Best Bet” scifi romances every month and
write mini reviews. That was the ‘price’ of me being on their platform and
spreading the scifi romance word. Fair enough, their platform, their rules! I
transferred this ‘best bet’ activity to the Love in Panels blog when editor
Suzanne Krohn from H&H decided to continue writing a romance-based blog
after MacMillan shut down the old H&H.
I only talk about books which I personally enjoyed and can
recommend. I review three from each month’s flood of new SFR releases, which I
report on a factual basis weekly on my own blog. Here’s a sample report of New Releases New
Releases in #SciFi and #Fantasy Romance for Wednesday March 21 .
I try to change the Best Bet titles up monthly, not to focus on just one series or author, and include a
couple of well-known SFR authors (because many of the best release new books
monthly these days, or so it seems) and hopefully a newcomer or author with fewer
titles, whose book took and held my attention. I don’t give stars or any other
rating. I do a blend of plot hilite
recaps, using snips of dialog or description I really liked, and remarks about
what I enjoyed most. Maybe it was the feisty heroine, the use of an unusual setting,
the hero’s determination or an unexpected plot twist that stood out (I don’t do
spoilers). On rare occasions if something in the book bugged me enough, I might
mention it. One title that I totally enjoyed last year had the hero calling the PhD
heroine ‘honey’ and ‘sweetheart’ from the moment they met. Yeah, don’t EVER try
condescending endearments with me. So I mentioned that but stressed how much I’d
enjoyed the rest of the book.
Some authors who do wonderful worldbuilding, great
characters and twisty plots are just too steamy for me, so I might mention that
in one of these mini review ‘best bet’ columns. I like a certain amount of hot times in a
book but there are readers who go for many more scenes of this type than I do,
so I figure my statement won’t hurt the book’s chances.
Obviously in a best bets column I’m not going to discuss
books I didn’t like. No one but me (and Amazon) will ever know how many I might have sampled that month to find the ones I do feature.
Another reason I don’t do any other type of review is that I
read a book as an author. I can’t help but see pieces of the writer’s craft
peeking through. I contemplate what I would have done with plot twists. I nod
and say, oh yes, I see your foreshadowing. I see how you’re going to use those
seven brothers the hero has to set up the series.
It doesn’t keep me
from enjoying a good book! But I’m using a double lens if you will, and I’m not
going to write a review.
The only other time I do a review is if there’s something
special and I just really really want
to talk about it. I’m doing one of those next week on Anne Bishop’s Lake
Silence but that’s a rare thing for me, less than once a year.
I did do a revisit
to Andre Norton’s Witch World series once for my own blog.
And that’s a wrap on this topic!
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