What do to about slander in your book reviews

This is most likely not the right thread to put this in, but when you read my dilemma below it could very well tie in in with rejection and dejection.

I'm reaching out to fellow self published authors hoping for direction on a nightmare that appeared in my reviews on Amazon and Goodreads. Yesterday over thirty 1 star rate and reviews were posted on my books all calling me a child abuser, not to support a child abuser, and more lies about my religion. Then of course some may sprinkle in my writing is like a 4th grader. But they all focus on slandering me as a child abuser. It doesn't take a lot to see these accounts are spam, slanderous and defamation of character - violation of their policy. Most of them are newly created Amazon accounts and I'm their only review. My newest book went from a 4.8 star rating to a 2 rating just like that with these nauseating lies about me. I'm also a teacher and it could be some disgruntled student I didn't change a grade for, but the culprit(s) is not my focus at the moment. The defamation is and ruining my reputation is. It's crushed my readers platform. Plus I have query letters out to several agents. Imagine them going to my book page and seeing that.

Anyone have any suggestions for me other than emailing Amazon and Goodreads? I got a response from Amazon 7 hours ago that they would investigate it, but they are all still there.

Chris P said:

Talk to a lawyer to see if it fits the legal definition of slander, and if you have any recourse.

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I have talked to a lawyer who reviewed it and said it is definitely defamation of character, but the downside is its a lengthy and costly battle. These are fake accounts made up, so finding the true source will take time. But then I feel the damage is done.

Treehouseman said:

Unfortunately there is nothing much you can do. It happened to a friend of mine. Email GR and Amazon and hope your stalker moves on. They often remove spam reviews if you highlight them, but it can take a couple of weeks.

You can have some friends put in some reviews to address the concerns, or even change the HEADING to explain what is happening

If anything, Amazon only counts "people who reviewed" and not "stars". So thirty 1-star ratings will put you higher up the visibility algorithm than five 5-star ratings. Some people purposefully court 1-star ratings for this very purpose.

This is also one of the lesser known perks of traditional publishing, that for larger publishers there is a team plan put in place to deal with stalkers. It's one of the services that isn't quite promoted in the rush to self publish but it should be.

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What did you friend do? I was hoping to find a thread somewhere of someone who experienced this too, but all I can find is authors who get unfair reviews, not this slanderous kind. I can't imagine Amazon keeping these "reviews" up when they only say things such as "Don't support a child abuser" and "She's abused her child by locking her in the garage". But the wait is killing me. They keep popping up to. If Amazon takes them down, I then don't know how to prevent it from coming back.

Having a large publisher to help me with this would be a dream. Although now, when they come across my query letters and see 30 "reviews" of slander of me being a child abuser, I'm guessing they will move on.

Chris P said:

Is finding the person responsible required in order to get the defamatory reviews taken down? Probably not, and it sounds like finding the person is not what you want anyway. A letter from ScaryLawyer might get Amazon to act faster.

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It's so nauseating that I don't want to find the person because I don't want to engage them. I'm sure that is what they want, they want to know how this is greatly bothering me. Thank you for the idea with ScaryLawyer. Who is that? I Google that and found two people - ScaryLawyerGuy and then ScaryLawyer named Taney Legal. I'll reach out to whichever is the right one... or both of them at this point.

Marian Perera said:

I went to Amazon and looked up the reviews of one of Marion Zimmer Bradley's books The Mists of Avalon. Of the one- and two-star reviews, only one referred to allegations of sexual abuse. The others were all about problems with the book.

So I'm not convinced a publisher or agent is going to look at 30 reviews claiming child abuse and think that there must be some truth behind this. It's more likely that they'll see this as a smear campaign, similar to what happened to Lynn Shepherd when she ranted about how Rowling should stop writing. Now whether agents and publishers will consider a smear campaign to be a problem in and of itself, is a different matter.

I would also not have your friends posting reviews, unless these are actually reviews (i.e. their primary purpose is to provide feedback to customers about the book, not to address claims of child abuse or show support for you).

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Thank you for the feedback. Did Amazon take down the review that lied about the sexual abuse? I'm on day 3 and new 1 star reviews with this slander keep showing up. It doesn't stop, and I don't know how to get it to stop. Maybe Amazon is slow, but when the attacks are happening with no breaks, being slow feels like eternity. I think some are coming back around with new 1 star reviews and then trashing the book to make their review seem "valid". That is coincidental a "valid" 1 star review of my writing, plot development, etc is happening at the same time as the slanderous attacks. I don't know if Amazon will think about that. Most of the accounts are new accounts and only have me as a review and then they all like each other's comments.

I appreciate you thoughts on how publishers and agents will view it. I tend to lean towards they'll stay clear of considering a book that has a smear campaign attached to it because they'll not want to spin their wheels fighting that unless I am a J.K. Rowling. Which I am not.

veinglory said:

I assume you have reported the reviews? With Amazon if you escalate the request after the first response there is a good chance they will act on attack reviews. They have become more willing to do so after recent attack campaigns on high profile books.

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Thank you. Yes, I have. It's very emotionally draining to keep going back and reporting them. I'm trying not to become obsessive getting online to see if new ones popped up or have been taken down. I've had friends go and report them as abuse as well. Every day I send a new email out to Amazon with the problem. Maybe no one works on the weekend there? I've reached out to Amazon Author Central, KDP and a customer help email. Yesterday I got 2 generic emails back from Amazon that they got my email and will investigate its. But they are all still there. There are over 30 "reviews" that literally only say "Don't support this child abuser" or "The writer makes me sick with her child abuse". What is there to "investigate"? These are in clear violation of the policy.