This NEEDS More Reads!

MelancholyMan · Jan 7, 2012

Have you seen this? Holy crap. There's four kinds of books that come out:

1) Crap - 80%
2) Average - 15%
3) Good - 4.5%
4) Special - .4%
5) The rest - .1%
* link redacted by mod* is a 5.5.

Just some guy working on his own. Why don't we get more like this from the BigSix?

Literateparakeet · Jan 7, 2012

Hmmm, you wouldn't by any chance trying to push your own book here would you?

Five 5-star reviews (suspicious, in and of itself). The reviews were not very well written (yep, now I'm critiquing reviews, LOL). I wondered, so I checked and yep...four of them have only reviewed one book, this one. One reviewer has actually reviewed one book besides this one.

Sorry, for me that is a huge turn off. Reviews should be real, not pure fluff from friends who don't seem to have even read the book.

I didn't see anything on the page that actually told me what the book was about to help interest me in reading it. You might want to fix that if you can.

Scribhneoir · Jan 7, 2012

MelancholyMan said:
Have you seen this? Holy crap. There's four kinds of books that come out:

1) Crap - 80%
2) Average - 15%
3) Good - 4.5%
4) Special - .4%
5) The rest - .1%

*redacted* is a 5.5.

Just some guy working on his own. Why don't we get more like this from the BigSix?

This kind of self-promotion is a huge turn off. You might want to reconsider your approach.

jjdebenedictis · Jan 7, 2012

Grrrr...

Donna Brown · Jan 7, 2012

I truly do not understand why some people are so against self-promotion. Why shouldn't an author try to generate sales for his or her work?

And why do some people assume that if reviews are not from professional reviewers the author solicited them from friends and family who haven't even bothered to read the book? Perhaps these people are excited AND well-meaning and posted because they wanted to . . . I'm not sure I understand the significance of the original post but I wish the author the best regardless.

backslashbaby · Jan 7, 2012

Donna Brown said:
I truly do not understand why some people are so against self-promotion. Why shouldn't an author try to generate sales for his or her work?

And why do some people assume that if reviews are not from professional reviewers the author solicited them from friends and family who haven't even bothered to read the book? Perhaps these people are excited AND well-meaning and posted because they wanted to . . . I'm not sure I understand the significance of the original post but I wish the author the best regardless.

It's a writers forum with all kinds of published authors. Self-promotion is politely limited to the places here designed for that

And I think it's good manners to say it's your work, not just a suggestion for a great book to read. Of course we all think our own work is a great suggestion

Anaquana · Jan 7, 2012

Donna Brown said:
I truly do not understand why some people are so against self-promotion. Why shouldn't an author try to generate sales for his or her work?

And why do some people assume that if reviews are not from professional reviewers the author solicited them from friends and family who haven't even bothered to read the book? Perhaps these people are excited AND well-meaning and posted because they wanted to . . . I'm not sure I understand the significance of the original post but I wish the author the best regardless.

I'm not against self-promotion, however, here at AW there's a specific board for Self-Promotion and this isn't it.

What I am against is self-promoting under the guise of promoting somebody else's work. Especially when that promotion seems to take a slap at other published works.

Williebee · Jan 7, 2012

Miss Donna- It isn't about being against self-promotion. It's about being against ham-handed methodology.

For example, this is a writer's community, a place where people give as well as take. A good methodology might be to say "I've written this book. Here's an excerpt. I want to share networking and promotional opportunities with other writers in this genre. If you like what you see from the excerpt, and from my website, let's swap blog posts."

Something where other members get more out of it than a simple "Pay attention to me!!!"

It's like driving in traffic. We take gap, we give gap, and we help each other get to our destinations.

ETA: I don't know that this is MelancholyMan's own book. Perhaps he will answer that question. My question is:

Where'd these statistics come from,a published critical analysis, or just an hour cruising the Amazon lists?

mccardey · Jan 7, 2012

Self-promotion can swamp all the other stuff. That's the problem.

It's just a question of realising that there are places where it's fine, and places where it gets in the way. And ways of doing it that are fine, and ways that are less than fine. Generally "tricksy" is less than fine.

Donna Brown · Jan 7, 2012

After I posted I realized this probably wasn't in the correct category.

Thanks for clarifying.

Anaquana said:
I'm not against self-promotion, however, here at AW there's a specific board for Self-Promotion and this isn't it.

What I am against is self-promoting under the guise of promoting somebody else's work. Especially when that promotion seems to take a slap at other published works.

Donna Brown · Jan 7, 2012

I agree. Thank you for this.

backslashbaby said:
It's a writers forum with all kinds of published authors. Self-promotion is politely limited to the places here designed for that

And I think it's good manners to say it's your work, not just a suggestion for a great book to read. Of course we all think our own work is a great suggestion

Donna Brown · Jan 7, 2012

Thanks, Williebee and mccardey. I keep thinking I have AW figured out, but obviously I don't. Your responses are so helpful to me.

Drachen Jager · Jan 7, 2012

Donna Brown said:
I truly do not understand why some people are so against self-promotion. Why shouldn't an author try to generate sales for his or her work?

There is a difference between self promotion and lying to potential customers. This (and what you did) frankly is an outright lie. Fabricating reviews is a way to cheat the system and the customer.

How would you feel if you bought a car based on a bunch of five star reviews only to find it's crap and the manufacturer paid those critics for their kind words?

happywritermom · Jan 7, 2012

escritora · Jan 7, 2012

The author of Multiplayer is a new member of AW. Maybe MelancholyMan just likes the book?

ETA: Here's a link to JohnAtPlotForge's announcement regarding his book, Multiplayer. Just want to note he did post in the correct forum. He's been a member since August of last year.

frimble3 · Jan 7, 2012

And, I took the link to Amazon and read the book's listing. Why is there more info about the author than about the book? The only description of the story is in the author's bio info, and it's just a few random bits and pieces.
Actually, it's a useful example of how not to do it.

Anaquana · Jan 7, 2012

If MelancholyMan is not the author of this book then I apologize for my assumption, but I stand by my position that promoting a book by taking a slam at other published books/publishing venues is bad form.

Soccer Mom · Jan 7, 2012

Yep. And I'm locking this little exercise. Folks, if you want to promote your own books, there is a place here for that. If you want to talk about something great you read, there is a bookclub here too.

This NEEDS More Reads!

MelancholyMan

Wear Thick Armor

Literateparakeet

Nerdy Budgie

Scribhneoir

Reinventing Myself

jjdebenedictis

is watching you via her avatar

Donna Brown

backslashbaby

*

Anaquana

needed a good laugh today

Williebee

Capeless, wingless, & yet I fly.

mccardey

Donna Brown

Donna Brown

Donna Brown

Drachen Jager

Professor of applied misanthropy

happywritermom

escritora

.

frimble3

Heckuva good sport

Anaquana

needed a good laugh today

Soccer Mom

Crypto-fascist

This NEEDS More Reads!

Wear Thick Armor

Nerdy Budgie

Reinventing Myself

is watching you via her avatar

~~~~*~~~~

needed a good laugh today

Capeless, wingless, & yet I fly.

Professor of applied misanthropy

.

Heckuva good sport

needed a good laugh today

Crypto-fascist

*