It’s a mystery to
me why readers are so resistant to writing reviews. I am referring to reviews in Amazon, iBooks, Barnes & Noble, etc. Sharing our opinions on
things we either love or hate is intrinsic to us. We love to tell our friends
about a great movie we just saw or a brand-new song we just heard or a
fantastic restaurant we discovered.
We love to “tell.”
Everything changes when we have to “write.” There seems to be an innate fear of
that five-letter word, even when the writing involves only a paragraph. This
creates a problem for authors because reviews are so intrinsic to our success.
I have friends who
will not read a book which has less than fifty reviews on Amazon. At the rate
of one review per month, (the average number for a non-bestseller) it will take
a book several years to reach fifty reviews. This is especially frustrating to
those of us trying to climb the ladder of reviews.
In asking
individual readers, I found that most of them don’t like writing book reviews
but have no problem writing reviews for other products. Ask them to review the
thumb drive or the Ninja blender they just bought, and they go to it with gusto,
pictures included.
Why then the reticence
to review a book? The answer possibly lies in the preconception that a reader is
expected to write a literary review. You know, those your English teacher made
you write.
Authors
themselves, when they write reviews for other authors, write such reviews. It’s
sad because by example, they discourage regular readers from reviewing. Often,
readers tell me they don’t write reviews because they don’t know how. I really
must stress that there is no set “how” in reviewing.
First, I’m
grateful for any review that seems heartfelt and honest, no matter the length.
You don’t have to write a literary criticism because my books are not literary
wonders written for college professors. No one is grading you.
Next, there is no
magic formula to follow. Write as if you were speaking to a friend or to
someone sitting next to you at the hair salon. The important thing is to
zoom-in on what you found most noticeable about the book.
A review should be
appropriate to the work. I would never give a Christian book a bad review
because it sells religion. To give a book a negative review because it has sex
scenes, and you happen to be totally against sex in books, is in rather bad
form too.
Any book with
explicit content is required to have a warning. If you don’t like sex in your
content, then don’t choose such books. In a fair review, you may mention that
the book has sex scenes; however, many readers like sex scenes and would rather
know if they were well written. The point: you should review fairly.
Finally, a review
need not be a composition-length work. A simple, heart-felt paragraph is often
worth a thousand words. The following is
a copy of a review written for my book Angel’s Guardian by an Amazon customer.
Notice the casual, informal tone, the missing caps, etc. The reader wrote a few
lines only, but she leaves no doubt as to how she feels about the book. I loved
this review!
Review at Amazon from Aliciaann
Definitely not your twilight vampire. More like
Brick in the Black series, by ms. Andrujiski. This series seems to be
comparable to it. I'm hooked already. I expect to be up most of the night
reading. Oh darn. I'm suffering from sleep deprivation again. Glad I'm retired
and can sleep till 10am
If you are nervous
about putting your thoughts in writing, try the following formula. Take the
last book you read, and write your review following my simple guidelines.
If you address
these simple points in your review, you can’t go wrong.
1.
This book is
(really great, really bad, ok, not my cup of tea, not for everyone).
2.
I really liked or
disliked (describe something you really liked or disliked about the book.
3.
I would highly recommend
this book (or not) and will definitely read (or not) this author’s books in the
future.
The following are
things some reviewers mention, but most don’t. Your review is yours and you
decide what to include.
***The
book has explicit scenes of sex and violence
***There are many
grammatic and spelling errors or the writing is flawless.
***The English
used is British English
***There was humor
in the book.
***There
was too much dialogue and not enough description (or the opposite).
***The characters
were believable and likeable (or not.)
Remember: I’d
rather have a short, honest review with misspellings and bad punctuation, that
speaks from the heart, than no review at all.
