Roar

In the end, it's all about how you feel about it.

You also have to see it from the reviewer's POV. If they stated why they didn't like it, with good reasoning, why would you feel threatened 'cause you liked the book? That's their opinion and they backed it up rationally. Are you fighting them 'cause they didn't like the book you liked? Or are they plain wrong?

There's a difference between:

"I hate this book, I hate the author, I hate this genre because of the author--"
And
"I don't believe this author fleshed out the character well enough and they seemed plain so it didn't create a strong dynamic in the plot. Because of this nook relied mostly on its intricate plot, I found much of it boring."

Actually, I like seeing bad reviews on books I love. When I'm bored I go to goodreads and look at the one and two star ratings, because I'm always very curious.

Sometimes the very things I like, others hate. Other times little things even I find annoying, others dislike with such vehemence it ruins the book for them.

Maybe it's because I'm a writer, or want to me, and it just soothes the panicked insecurity that even with what I consider great works you get such disparity, or maybe I'm just a little bit weird.

I don't read reviews on books. It's just people's opinions.

scribbledoutname said:

I hate reading bad reviews of my favorite books. It seriously sucks when people make snarky or haughty comments and insult the very things that you felt were awesome about a book.

Sometimes it sort of feels like an attack on me and my own ideals. I think I occasionally project myself onto the series I love because, as I write exactly the same thing, it's basically like looking into the future.

The annoying thing is that I can't stop their comments digging in because my observant writer side is always taking note of how I can "improve". Even when I know it's just a matter of opinion it's difficult to stop myself absorbing their comments, and later on it can throw me off ("Should I add more blood? Someone once said this-and-that story sucked because it didn't have enough blood!" etc.).

Aaargh. I guess I should start practising how to focus on the three-five star reviews and ignore the lower ones... The ones and twos are nice to read if you don't like a series but other than that it's like picking at a scab... xP

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Or just not read reviews at all. They aren't reviewing your work so I really don't see why you're getting so upset about them. Trust me. You'll feel better once you start ignoring them.

scribbledoutname said:

I hate reading bad reviews of my favorite books. It seriously sucks when people make snarky or haughty comments and insult the very things that you felt were awesome about a book.

Sometimes it sort of feels like an attack on me and my own ideals. I think I occasionally project myself onto the series I love because, as I write exactly the same thing, it's basically like looking into the future.

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If you feel insecure and unhappy when people don't like the things that you like, then you need to learn to deal with that neurosis.

It's just weird to expect the world to rearrange itself so that your insecurities never get triggered.

You can't please everyone, and you can't change your story because Lisa in Omaha doesn't like heroines with red hair. For all you know Lisa in Omaha is a deranged lunatic, or didn't even read the book, or is just trolling, or whatever.

Write what you like and want to write, and stop reading reviews. Definitely stop taking the tastes of other people personally.

xamich said:

Actually, I like seeing bad reviews on books I love. When I'm bored I go to goodreads and look at the one and two star ratings, because I'm always very curious.

Sometimes the very things I like, others hate. Other times little things even I find annoying, others dislike with such vehemence it ruins the book for them.

Maybe it's because I'm a writer, or want to me, and it just soothes the panicked insecurity that even with what I consider great works you get such disparity, or maybe I'm just a little bit weird.

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I still smile every time I think of a one-star review left on THE GODFATHER (film), by someone claiming to be a film student, who said it was boring crap and McG makes much better movies and they couldn't believe their film teacher wasted their time showing THE GODFATHER.

Someone left a reply saying, "Perhaps film studies is not the best path for you."

xamich said:

Actually, I like seeing bad reviews on books I love. When I'm bored I go to goodreads and look at the one and two star ratings, because I'm always very curious.

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If I'm deciding whether or not to read a book, I'll read the 'bad' (low-star rating) reviews. If they write about issues that I know will irritate me (i.e. "the plot was inconsistent"... "riddled with plotholes"... "contains numerous, obvious grammatical errors", etc.) then I know not to waste my time.

If all they can find to complain about is "this book was too long!" or "I didn't get it!" or "I hate [this genre]!" or "I hate first-person present tense!" or make snarky comments that don't really tell me anything about the book itself, then I usually figure I'll give it a try.

Keep in mind that lately there has been discussion about questionable reviews left by people hoping to influence the star rating of a book. I've read a bit about competing authors writing bad reviews to boost their own works, or concerns that self-pub authors are getting all their friends to leave 5 star ratings to move something up on Amazon.

I can't imagine making time for this.

It's a strange world we live in.

Stacia Kane said:

I still smile every time I think of a one-star review left on THE GODFATHER (film), by someone claiming to be a film student, who said it was boring crap and McG makes much better movies and they couldn't believe their film teacher wasted their time showing THE GODFATHER.

Someone left a reply saying, "Perhaps film studies is not the best path for you."

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Haha I love it.

WKlein said:

If I'm deciding whether or not to read a book, I'll read the 'bad' (low-star rating) reviews. If they write about issues that I know will irritate me (i.e. "the plot was inconsistent"... "riddled with plotholes"... "contains numerous, obvious grammatical errors", etc.) then I know not to waste my time.

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I do this often too. I'm a kindle reader, so I download the sample and if hasn't completely wow'ed me, I check the low star reviews to see if some of my pet peeves will be coming up.

Turn your comment around, scribbledoutname. Have you posted negative comments on a novel (or thought about it)? If you have or wanted to, how do you consider your negative comment would effect anyone else? Would you expect the author or other authors to take your comments to heart?

Did you write a negative review when others loved the book? Perhaps consider that, if you give negative comments freely without assuming others will get upset, then turn that to yourself. Every reader has a different outlook on a novel, and that outlook does not apply to you or your writing personally.

Reading reviews by people who disagree with me is fun. It gives me a chance to feel all superior to the idiots.

I like to read other people's negative and positive reviews, it lets me learn things that I might not have learned about writing otherwise. When I first read Eragon I loved it, I don't read that much fantasy and didn't realise that it was full of cliches. I learned a lot from others opinons.

I read a book last year by a well known author, and I thought it was very bland, and that there where other authors writing the same style novels, but doing it much better, and they where still repeating the same historical inaccuracies. All the reviews where 5* last time I looked on Amazon.

What I do wonder is why you feel threatened. I wonder if you feel that these negative reviewers might have had a point?

I like reading 1 star reviews for books I liked, and 5 star reviews for books I didn't. It's interesting, to me, to see if people missed the point, etc., and also if they saw something that I missed.

It goes like this

Other people like different stuff in books than you do


Simple as that. And they're allowed to. You don;t have to agree with them, but getting het up about it (esp when it isn't your book!) does..what exactly? There is no book in this world that is universally loved. So consider what hey say IF it seems sensible, ignore it if it seems stupid- and then write your book.

People are different Vive le difference!

scribbledoutname said:

I can accept that people have opinions but there are some things that still bug me, like that commenter feeling the main character was stupid/incompetent and giving the book one star and then listing the very things that show that competence as reasons for the character's stupidity. I understand that it's their opinion, and this is how they view the entire story, but it can be hard to not get annoyed by people criticizing things in a way that you don't agree with/don't feel makes sense. If they explain their reasons (I wish there was more character development) then you can't really disagree, but if their reasons are things that really throw you off it's... strange.

I'm trying to get used to the idea of ignoring reviews like this... comments are too useful to not mine them for information xO

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At the end of the day, though, how does this affect you? Are you the author? Is the author a relative/close friend of yours? Are you the editor or publisher? If you answered "no" to any of the above, let it go. The only thing that'll happen is you'll drive yourself nuts with worry.

I've seen this sort of thing all over teh intarwebz since Day One. Somebody's favorite movie/book/TV show/album gets slagged on and the gloves come off. Even when there's a well-reasoned explanation why somebody doesn't like something, people get bent out of shape because it isn't universally loved and admired (cases in point: Twilight, any of the Star Trek or Star Wars franchises, Quentin Tarantino, Justin Bieber, The Big Bang Theory...you get the idea). This is how flame wars start and we start threads on "WHY AUTHORS SHOULD NOT RESPOND TO GOODREADS REVIEWS".

Let it go. Life's too short to worry about these things. I know people have gone off on things I adore but you know what? I don't know what they've said because I've ignored their reviews and comments on teh intarwebz. I don't care what they've said. It's more entertaining to look at pictures of lolzcatz, anyway.

scribbledoutname said:

Yeah I'll try harder

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Really this is no different to the fact that I love show X and my husband loves show Y ,and we both roll our eyes a bit at each other.

In every aspect of life, you have to understand that otehr people like different stuff. I like food Z, but it makes my son heave, so I only cook it when it's just me and hubs. Product H makes my daughter come out in hives, so we find an alternative for her. My husband thinks food I is the best EVER! I would rather eat my own eyelids.

It's just like that. Just like that. Accept that others don't have the same eyes/tastebuds as you, and you'll be half way there.

scribbledoutname said:

I agree with trying to glean stuff from the comments, which is why I'm usually there.

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I do this, too. In fact, I think I've learned some of the most valuable things I ever have about writing from reading reviews and critiques.

So I'm going to take a little bit of a different opinion from the other people in this thread.

Sure. Some reviews are just badly written. And sometimes you just need to let 'em go. (This is true of good reviews, also -- sometimes I think a book is the most badly-written, actively offensive piece of excrement and the five-star reviews loved everything I hated, which has on occasion made me rage unhealthily.)

But. But.

(Again, I'm coming from the same "reading reviews to learn from them" place you are. Keep that in mind. )

Some of the times I've learned the most from reviews were from excoriating reviews I disagreed with entirely starting out. And Dresden Files is actually a good example of that, for me. The first time I saw a bad review of it I had a knee-jerk response opposing the author of the review on every point.

Now, years later, I'm a much better writer, and . . . I see a lot of problems with the Dresden Files. I still like this series! I do. I'm not trying to dump on it. But I see critics' points about it, including, in fact, the points in the review you posted. Again, I still enjoy the books, but now I also look at reviews like that and think, "Hmm. Okay. That's fair."

So . . . maybe another strategy here would be to give yourself permission to find issues with the books you love (or at least recognize others' perceived issues). For me, even if I ultimately still end up disagreeing with the reviewer's points, that mindset has helped stop the crazymaking rage. (In addition to straight issues of writing quality, a lot of times the things I'm acknowledging as being problems are poor depictions of race/gender/etc., and this link helps calm the madness with regard to that -- I can acknowledge a reviewer's point that, hey, this book has some downright shitty depictions of women, and even if maybe I saw them as subversions, I can see why other people wouldn't, etc.. But I think the same mindset can also apply to writing quality -- it makes me a lot less crazy to look at a book I love and acknowledge, hey, this author used that cliche, and that's part of the reason I love it, but maybe for someone else it drove 'em nuts.)

Anyway, not saying this would work for you. But I do the same thing you do reading reviews, and it's made me a lot less crazy since I've started giving bad reviews the benefit of the doubt and tried to figure out what perspective they were coming from and why they might have a point. I might still disagree, but approaching it this way makes me feel better and makes me a better writer, even though a necessary casualty is the pedestal I formerly held the book on.

WKlein said:

If I'm deciding whether or not to read a book, I'll read the 'bad' (low-star rating) reviews. If they write about issues that I know will irritate me (i.e. "the plot was inconsistent"... "riddled with plotholes"... "contains numerous, obvious grammatical errors", etc.) then I know not to waste my time.

If all they can find to complain about is "this book was too long!" or "I didn't get it!" or "I hate [this genre]!" or "I hate first-person present tense!" or make snarky comments that don't really tell me anything about the book itself, then I usually figure I'll give it a try.

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I do something similar, if all the one- and two-star reviews are from people whose tastes and needs obviously diverge wildly from mine, I know I can dismiss them (and see Least Helpful, a great Tumblr blog of ridiculous negative reviews).

There are a bunch of low-star reviews of the HBO version of Angels in America on Amazon that boil down to "what's all this gay shit?" It's hilarious.

While on one hand, I can see where you're coming from, on the other...honestly, this seriously sounds like you feel the reviewer is calling into question your ability to choose something good to like and that's bothering you.

You like Harry Dresden. The character, the world, the magic system, it all works for you. You might (I don't know, but I'll just assume for argument's sake) even think that Butcher is a fabulous writer that he was able to get you to love this character with all his foibles and that gives him higher ranks in your eyes. It's your taste and it's something you like.

Then along comes this reviewer who, in essence, says 'UR STUPID 4 LIEKING THIS STUPID SHIT BECUZ IZ STUPID' and that's insulted you. You are insulted that someone is calling you stupid for liking something. They're calling into question your ability to discern something good from something bad and they're saying you are stupid for liking it.

And no one likes to be told they're stupid for holding an opinion. Not many like to be told their opinion is stupid, either.

However, it's also conflating who you are with what you like and allowing someone else to define who you are by what you like as well.

Why read a review of a book you already know you love? The purpose of a review is to find good books you haven't yet read.

I don't read any reviews because I flat don't care what any reviewer thinks of a book. I have a lot of friends who read, and if they tell me I need to try a book, I try it. But reviews? Nope, never.