Reviewing Books is Harder Than It Looks
When I penned my first novel, I remember being both excited and terrified all at the same time. I had finished my first book. I even had some decent feedback on it while I wrote my first draft. I didn’t even know what the next step was, but I was just happy about completing that one.
I ended up not publishing that one, but instead published the second one I wrote, “Take It Off.” I finished that one with the same excitement, but a new determination to self-publish. My publishing journey wasn’t the most enjoyable, but complete. I had my book professionally edited and even had a photoshoot followed by a graphically designed cover. Ready or not, I hit that publishing button.
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When I started sharing with those around me, I was surrounded by opinions. Most opinions came from people that had never even read my book, but still the opinions came. Some of the people that had read my book liked it. A few didn’t. One called it raunchy, which I could decide if I viewed that as a compliment or an insult. When you write erotic romance, the term “raunchy” lies in that gray area that requires context.
Anyway, I remember what it felt like to get a negative review. Especially, when someone went into details of how they didn’t like what I had spent months reviewing. This was also during the time when self-published authors weren’t seen well, so people were extra critical.
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Becoming that person for someone else was never my goal. I don’t like giving negative reviews. Mind you, there have been some books that I have read that were absolutely atrocious and not only deserved a negative review but deserved to be pulled from all publishing catalogs. However, those books had deeper issues than a confusing plot or editing problems. In those instances, authors need to be held accountable for the damage they cause and so do publishers. Which makes it even harder to criticize an author that has put in the work and just hasn’t grasped the full skillset or writing or just hasn’t run into his/her/their audience.
Make no mistake, there are indeed authors that have put out books that aren’t ready to be published. They haven’t studied the craft of writing at all, much less their genre. It isn’t hard to find those. Those stick out like a sore thumb. Negative reviews can draw attention to those in a way that doesn’t help matters at all. You are either drawing attention to bad work thereby putting more eyes on the work and inadvertently rewarding them, or you end up bullying that writer. In either scenario, there is no incentive to improve the writing. Some of those writers can actually become good, but it can be overwhelming at first.
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My philosophy is this: I only want to talk about books that I’ve enjoyed. I want to talk about books that have made me cry, laugh, or angry (in a good way). I want to talk about books that may not be the most writer’s craft-y or Pulitzer winning, but are still good. I want to talk about books in a way that a writer would. I want to talk about some lessons I learned from how that writer writes or wrote a particular thing.
My reviews may end up being in the same vein as the Movie Analysis, so that means they will also be long. I’m okay with that and hope you will be too. I will also not be reviewing books when they are “new.” I will be reviewing books as I get to them. My first book review will actually be a book that came out early last year. I will also try to review without looking at other people’s reviews. This first review will be a little tainted since I read it in a book club, but my opinions didn’t necessarily match everyone’s theirs anyway, so I will still be able to show my perspective.
Anyway, that’s all I have for today. Keep an eye out for the first of my book reviews coming soon.
Until Next time…Later babes…
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