Reviews, Good, Bad and Friendly

There've been several to-do's going on in the romance/blog/Amazon world lately, which has occupied waaay too freakin' much of my time in reading all about it. I've come to a couple of conclusions a few thousand posts/comments later:

1 -- there is a distinct mob mentality on some blogs

2 -- said mob mentality really does not take kindly when someone dares to hold another opinion

3 -- or dares to poke a little fun at them for their passion! their pronouncements from on high! their hostility!

4 -- there appears to be a tremendous -- huge -- incredible -- number of authors out there that I've never heard of who are so morally/emotionally superior to the rest of us

I ain't getting into what started the whole thing in the first place -- Google "Deborah MacGillivray" and you'll find a whole smorgasbord of choices to read up on it if you're interested.

What I am getting into is a topic that came up as sort of a sideline: reviews and authors. Reviews are a part of this business. Good ones are a nice ego stroke that lasts about five minutes. Bad ones can shake your faith in yourself and stick with you like a bad case of poison ivy.

At least, for virtually every author I've ever known in my twenty-plus years in the business. Except for the group mentioned in #4 above.

Reviews are about the books, they say. Reviews aren't personal. Bad reviews don't bother me. I learn from them. No REAL author would get upset over a bad review.

I had to Google a bunch of these names to find out who the heck they are and found that, on average, they didn't have a whole lot of books between them, so in the overall scheme of things, they can't be talking about a whole lot of reviews here, good, bad, or otherwise. And yet they are so far above those multi-published, best-selling, award-winning authors who admit to being senstive to negative reviews. THEY are, in their oh-so-worthy opinions, REAL authors, while we sensitive folks are pissy little whiny-babies.

I hate to quote Shakespeare -- never like the old bard, and will probably get it wrong -- but I think there's a large element of "methinks they doth protest too much" going on here. I don't know how it works for mystery writers, or science fiction or fantasy or literary authors, but in romance, if you're not putting a big chunk of yourself into your story, you're not doing it justice. Romance novels are all about the emotion, and emotion can only come from deep inside you. Misquoting someone else here, "Writing is easy. Just open a vein."

If you dig down inside yourself for your book, if you've invested yourself in it, then it gets a bad review, it's gonna hurt. People can insist otherwise until they're blue in the face, but I don't believe it for a second. The only way, IMO, that it could NOT hurt is if you didn't invest yourself emotionally in the story. And God knows, I've read plenty enough books where that seems to be the case, where the characters, while often well-written, are so surface and flat that the only honest emotion I felt was dissatisfaction at the lack of emotion.

Note: twice above I used "IMO." IN MY OPINION. This is my blog; it's my opinion. You can disagree with me, but you can't prove my opinion wrong because it's an OPINION.

One other thing that's come up in this mess: the soliciting of reader reviews on Amazon. Oh, I would never do that, the authors who've spoken up have said. Shameful. Unprofessional. Cheating. Unfair. Dishonest.

Bullshit. IMO.

I've been asked by a lot of people if I would post reviews on Amazon for their books. And let me be totally honest: I've also asked people at times if they would post for mine, and sometimes they've done it.

I've never suggested what they should say or how many stars they should give, and no one's ever asked that of me, either. But there have been occasions, especially if someone's already told me that they liked the book, when I've asked if they'd take time to do a reader review. I admit it freely. I don't see anything shameful, unprofessional, or dishonest about it.

There's long been a saying in business along the lines of, "If you like our service, tell your friends." Word of mouth is generally agreed to be the most effective advertising around. The Internet just takes that to a different level. Today's "word of mouth" takes place online more often than off -- emails, forums, IMs, Amazon, B&N.com, review sites, etc.

Are there glowing reviews online for books done by the author's friends, family, and fans for the sole purpose of promoting the book? Of course. I've posted Amazon reviews for authors I know and for authors I've never met. I post reviews because I like the books and because I believe others will like them, too. It's what I do instead of writing fan mail. I've never met the author who didn't appreciate fan mail, but only the author (and, occasionally, the publisher) sees it. When I'm in reader mode and I've finished a book I really liked, recommending it to others is my little bit of push for it so the author can make money and continue to write more books for me to enjoy.

And so what if there are glowing reviews written by the author's friends, family, and fans? Aren't most readers savvy enough to use reviews as a guideline, not a bible? Just like the hype the publisher gives a book, just like the endorsements other authors give: it's another bit of info about the title that may or may not help sell the book, that may or may not resonate with the reader.

Another quote (wow, this is the post for them!): buyer beware. Books, like every other aspect of life where there's a choice, are a crapshoot. Yeah, it's annoying to spend $6 or $12 on a book that I wind up not liking, but at least I can return it and get my money back or trade it in at a used bookstore for something else. There are plenty of times I've spent $10-20 on a dinner out that sucked pond water, too, but there's no way to recoup my losses on that. It's already gone to my hips.

Read the back cover blurb. Read the endorsements and the excerpt and the reviews. If the story sounds interesting, or if the author's always been a good one for you, or if the excerpt grabs your attention, buy the book.

My point is, if readers buy a book simply because there are twenty-five glowing reviews of it on Amazon, they KNOW there's a chance they might not like it. They KNOW those reviews could be written by the author's mother, husband, sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews, best friends, and puppy. They KNOW they're taking a chance. They have that right. Just as I have the right to continue posting positive reviews of books I've liked, even if they are written by people I also like. Rachel1:23 PM