Writers reviewing books?

Some authors have a thing about not being negative, but it makes your reviews less useful as reviews if you do that. I give my honest opinion on books, which can include one-star reviews where I hated everything. However, I'm self-published, so I don't have to deal with agents or editors not liking it.

I don't review books, mostly as self-protection--I've seen/heard about too many vendettas inspired by authors taking exception to other authors' reviews of their books. If I love someone's book, I support it by recommending it to other readers.

Marissa D said:

I don't review books, mostly as self-protection--I've seen/heard about too many vendettas inspired by authors taking exception to other authors' reviews of their books. If I love someone's book, I support it by recommending it to other readers.

Click to expand...

Ditto this. I've thought occasionally about reviewing books, but only ones I like (which may be why some authors only give 4-5 star reviews).

Nobody wants to start a food fight. It's also professional ethic not to badmouth your competitors.

I've taken the advice that to use GR more effectively as an author, it's good to share reviews occasionally, to show you're active on the platform. And I have found that it helps a bit. People 'like' my reviews and my updates about books I'm reading. It's started some conversations from time to time.

As others above pointed out, I am careful to avoid pissing people off, and rather than giving books a rating, I leave that blank, and I keep my reviews, or really comments/general impressions, I'd say 90% positive. Even when there's something that I didn't care for, I put it gently, and if I really didn't like a book, I just shelve it as read without any comments. Anyway, that approach has been working for me so far. I know authors really like getting star ratings for the sake of upping their numbers and raising visibility, but it's just not worth it to me since even giving a 4 star rating versus a 5 imposes some judgment that I'd really like to avoid answering for.

lizmonster said:

I've thought occasionally about reviewing books, but only ones I like (which may be why some authors only give 4-5 star reviews).

Click to expand...

This. Lately, I've been trying to take the time to rate and review books, especially for newer writers who could really use them. But I don't want to say anything negative about another person's work either. So this is how I've been handling it...if I like the book a lot and give it four or five stars, I try to also leave a written review. If I give it three stars, meaning I *liked* it, but didn't *love* it for one reason or another, I generally don't give a written review. If I didn't like it, I don't rate or review it at all--but this is rare. I truly enjoy reading and getting lost in other people's worlds, and since I try to only choose topics and genres that interest me in the first place, I rarely dislike a book that much.

D.L. Shepherd said:

This. Lately, I've been trying to take the time to rate and review books, especially for newer writers who could really use them. But I don't want to say anything negative about another person's work either. So this is how I've been handling it...if I like the book a lot and give it four or five stars, I try to also leave a written review. If I give it three stars, meaning I *liked* it, but didn't *love* it for one reason or another, I generally don't give a written review. If I didn't like it, I don't rate or review it at all--but this is rare. I truly enjoy reading and getting lost in other people's worlds, and since I try to only choose topics and genres that interest me in the first place, I rarely dislike a book that much.

Click to expand...

This is exactly what I do, although, I have had several books recently that I couldn't finish. I don't talk about those books at all, and for the most part, I don't put them in my reading list.

I review under another name and/or my partner's Amazon account.


I rarely give 5 stars. You've got to be the next Gene Wolfe or Le Guin to earn that from me and tbh not all of their books get 5 either so, there you go.

Most get 4 (good, enjoyed, would recommend). 3 is recommended with some reservations. 2, not recommended. 1, unsalvageable.

I don't give out a lot of 1s either. Most books are salvageable.

I'm very wary about doing this, for obvious reasons, especially as I get sent a lot of ARCs these days. It may not be the spirit of the thing, but basically if I don't feel I can give a new release four or five stars I decline to leave a review. For old work or non-fiction books I call it as I see it, but that's different.

How new is 'new' out of interest? More than a couple years? Longer? Just curious!

Last few years, I suppose, but I'm thinking more of things I get sent before they're actually released.

I review under my own name on both GR and Amazon, and I do give harsh reviews (1 or 2 stars) when I feel it is merited. But no-one pays attention to me.

I only review on Goodreads/Amazon when I can give five stars. I try to offer enough details in my review to give a sense of who else might enjoy the book, because generic five-star reviews ("Stunning!" "A page turner!") are never that helpful to me.

I also write newspaper book reviews as part of my job, under my own name, with no star ratings. It's the nature of most newspaper book review sections that you rarely pan things, and when you do, you make sure to punch up and not down (i.e., you might say the bestselling author's highly promoted latest is not up to snuff, but you don't trash self-published or tiny-press books when they're bad; you ignore them). Also, most of the books I review are adult, and I write YA. I have turned out medium-scathing reviews from time to time, and a bunch of polite "meh" reviews, but not of my colleagues or competitors. That said, there are a few authors I probably wouldn't be able to network with for this reason, unless they are like me and avoid reading most reviews.

I enjoy reviewing books and have often flirted with running a book blog, but have always refrained from doing so as I feel my status as a published author puts a funny slant on it. So I review anonymously on Goodreads instead. This works out so much better for me because I'm naturally a very critical reader, and critical reviews are also the ones I find most interesting to read; the majority of my reviews are 2 or 3 stars, and I give 1 stars to books I couldn't finish. I also find it easier to express and write about what I felt didn't work in a book, or anything that hampered my enjoyment as reader, or anything that struck me as wrong. I do include praise as well but it tends to come off sounding generic. I'm always constructive with my crit and never nasty - I as an author would have no problem reading a review from someone who was critical about my book but fair and could articulate why they didn't like it clearly - but I know reading anything critical, measured or not, might upset other authors. No one wants to see a less than glowing review.

So, because I am critical and analytical, I think I'd run into problems if people knew who I really was. If I were reviewing as an author, I'd be a lot more positive. Which feels a little disingenuous, but seems to be the way it is done - authors will always publically support authors.

Oh wow, I never thought about that. I review books on goodreads all the time and never considered what would happen if I were the author. I give critical reviews when necessary and don’t hold back when I don’t like it, but I assume no one reads my reviews anyway. Certainly not the author. I wouldn’t want to read a negative review of my book either.

I have seen authors on goodreads review books they like. Never saw a bad review from an author. I think if I get to the point where I actually get something published I’d have to create a new goodreads profile lol. It’s easy to hide behind a screen name but if you’re known, well, I wouldn’t want to give a negative review to a fellow author!

RaggyCat said:

authors will always publically support authors.

Click to expand...

Not always.

Quiet Melody said:

Oh wow, I never thought about that. I review books on goodreads all the time and never considered what would happen if I were the author. I give critical reviews when necessary and don’t hold back when I don’t like it, but I assume no one reads my reviews anyway. Certainly not the author. I wouldn’t want to read a negative review of my book either.

I have seen authors on goodreads review books they like. Never saw a bad review from an author. I think if I get to the point where I actually get something published I’d have to create a new goodreads profile lol. It’s easy to hide behind a screen name but if you’re known, well, I wouldn’t want to give a negative review to a fellow author!

Click to expand...

I asked an Orbit editor about this on twitter and she said, if you've written bad reviews of other authors it won't stop you getting published in future, nobody checks ;-) So only worry about it after publication (and even then, it's only rarely an issue... probably becuase most of us are such small fry...)

Putputt said:

I want to start reviewing books on Goodreads and possibly cross-post onto a blog, and I’m torn between doing it anonymously or under my own name. In the event that my books ever get pubbed, would it be a problem if people know I’ve been reviewing books? I don’t plan on being snarky or ripping books apart, but I would like to be honest in my reviews. I’ve noticed that the authors I follow on GR tend to only give four or five-star reviews. Is there an etiquette that writers adhere to about not giving negative reviews on other people’s books?

Click to expand...

I think a good way to do this is to only review books you loved. There’s a lot of great stuff out there. Build up the writers that you think deserved to be noticed. This helps you look like a positive force in the writing community. There’s a lot of negativity these days, so I don’t see anything wrong with trying to remain positive. If you read a terrible book, just ignore it. You don’t have to review everything.

I get that with GR and Amazon this starts to screw up the ratings, but I find arbitrary aggregate ratings for books to be problematic anyway.