Bad Reviews - Oh the pain!

This discussion cropped up recently, but 3 stars is still a decent rating. In most places 3/5 stars is Good. Average. Not Bad But Not Amazing. Don't bemoan a 3 star review.

It's not our job to police how other people read and rate our books. Our job to write the books, and then make sure readers get the very best possible copy of that book when they make a purchase.

Bad reviews don't necessarily mean they'll negatively affect sales. I've seen readers say they like reading 1 and 2 star reviews, because it gives them a more balanced opinion to go along with the 4 and 5 star reviews. It's impossible for all readers to love one book. No single book is so amazing that it actually has nothing but 5 star reviews, and if it does, I'll probably skip reading it.

Don't read reviews. Easier to say than to actually follow, but it bears repeating.

Get over it. I'm not saying that in a harsh way. If you want to be a writer - and work in a business that depends upon other peoples opinions - then you need to get over it.

Need help getting over it? Then pick your favorite writer... actor... director...ect... then google them and I guarantee you find someone who absolutely hates their work. Actually, I bet you find a ton of them. Then you will understand that you can't please everyone.

The first film I made got trashed on IMDB... and it was our very first review. I mean totally tore it apart. It killed me and my friends who worked on it. But now... now I am a better person from it because I know you can't satisfy everyone.

Make it a positive experience. It will make you a stronger person. But, do not dwell on it. Don't let it eat you up inside.

Get over it - and prove them wrong.

Everyone gets bad reviews (except I guess KTC ). And it always hurts. People have different tastes, and that's all there is to it. For example I write funny books, this leads people to say things like "A fun read but no substance". Does it hurt? Yes. Do I believe I write substantive novels despite the comic tone? Yes. Is there anything I can do about their reactions? Nope. Some people automatically equate funny with fluff and their aint nothing I can do about it.

I even had a 1 star that read "So...stupid." That's it. Also had someone want to hit me over the head with a flower pot.

My point? This is the tough bit of being a writer. Even some of the most successful books out there have 1 star reviews. It isn't meaningful, it isn't a sign, it's just how it goes. Best thing to do? Stop reading them. I don't visit goodreads anymore, and you know, I don't miss it .

These are Amazon reviews? Why are you reading them at all?

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But on a larger subject: If you can't afford an editor, you can't afford to self-publish.

Writing is free; money flows toward the author. The publisher pays for all the goodies. When you become your own publisher you have to pay for the editing, the copyediting, the proofreading, the art, the production, the publicity, the marketing....

When you chose to self-publish you chose the hardest, most costly path out there.

Luis Samways said:

The review in question did say that my book had some typos and overall some lack of shine (i had no money to get some one to proof read it, so i did it myself, 6 times) Then I reread it and found that maybe she was overeating. I counted two typos and one spelling mistake. So i dismissed it as pure "customer knows best" and didn't really hold water to it. Then a few days later (Actually 2 minutes ago) I spotted what must be the most unhelpful review I have ever read, this time from the US (Other review was from the uk)

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Overeating? That can certainly cause someone to give bad reviews.

Just kidding of course. Seriously, it sounds like your feelings are hurt over her review. It's just a review.

If you choose to self-publish, you need to get an editor because they are not provided in house.

How can I possibly not kick my self for starting this writing thing when my two reviews I have gotten are quite the opposite of what I was hoping for. A five star review would be nice lol

I guess what I'm trying to say, has any one else had bad reviews they wish didn't crop up?

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Don't read the reviews.

If you do read the reviews and people are saying you have typos, or your story falls flat, then take an objective view and consider that they might be on to something. Nobody is perfect. Again, if you choose to self-publish, you need to have your work edited prior to publishing. They are expensive.

Luis Samways said:

Id say after running my manuscript through Gramarly, I can finally see why some people would find my writing to be terribly unprofessional. Seems as if I need to not rush to release, and focus more on polishing my work.

Obviously Gramarly wouldn't substitute a real person, but it does point out my flaws and help me learn the art of proper English!

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Beware of online grammar checks, and even the ones in your word processor. They are not 100% accurate. You have to know your grammar well to use those tools.

Terie said:

In general, I'd agree with you. But someone who dislikes an entire genre really ought not be reviewing books in that genre. That's just common sense.

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Why? What if I feel like reviewing a book in a genre I don't like? Maybe to talk about why I don't like the genre. Or because this particular book caught my attention for some reason. Or because I felt like giving the genre another chance. Or because for any number of other reasons I might read such a book.

August Talok said:

Need help getting over it? Then pick your favorite writer... actor... director...ect... then google them and I guarantee you find someone who absolutely hates their work. Actually, I bet you find a ton of them. Then you will understand that you can't please everyone.

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Ha. Yes. A few days ago I went over to Goodreads to look up the reviews on a particular book that I absolutely adore, curious to see if other people had said interesting things about my favorite parts.

The first several reviews were utterly dominated by a bunch of people from a book club who'd all read the book together. Many of them said outright that they didn't like the genre, or had never read anything in that genre before, and that they only read it because of it being assigned in that club. They wrote long, long reviews that rambled about how they felt about the genre in general, and gave almost universally bad ratings for...well, genre conventions, largely. (And matters of personal taste.)

I was briefly very annoyed. Why should all these people who didn't even want to read the book dominate the reviews? Someone coming to glance over the reviews will see several angry comments from people who don't even like the genre, before they even get to see a review from someone who does!

...but then I realized that, really, people who read in this genre are going to notice pretty fast that those reviews are all of the "I can't believe this fantasy novel had vampires in it! Who wants vampires?" type, and people who like lush prose will take "and it used long words, and talked about how things smelled too much! I don't care how things smell!" with a grain of salt. So ultimately, even if it annoys me a little, it's just another de gustibus non disputandum est moment.

It also made me swear to never read reviews--Kirkus aside--once I'm properly published. If it bugs me that much when they're just talking about an author I like, why should I put myself through that much pain reading what they say about my work?

(honestly, I'd avoid Kirkus too. They seem to often not actually understand the book they are reviewing, and enjoy being particularly nasty just for fun. It means even when I've gotten a positive review from them it's been meaningless to me.)

Toothpaste said:

Everyone gets bad reviews (except I guess KTC )

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Don't jinx me man! (-: They'll come...they just haven't arrived yet. I only have about 60 or so reviews at present. Not a lot of readers. (-:

Luis Samways said:

Id say after running my manuscript through Gramarly, I can finally see why some people would find my writing to be terribly unprofessional. Seems as if I need to not rush to release, and focus more on polishing my work.

Obviously Gramarly wouldn't substitute a real person, but it does point out my flaws and help me learn the art of proper English!

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There's a lot more to editing than just checking the grammar, Luis. Really. Grammar-checking is only a minor part of the work that a good editor does.

My first thought with grammar is that you might not know there are problems. I teach writing, and honestly a lot of people make mistakes not because they haven't gone over it, but because they didn't recognize that they were mistakes in the first place. And then with fiction writing there's the even more difficult element of knowing when to artistically break grammatical rules. I'm not saying there is something wrong with your writing--just that it's possible that you are missing things. That's one of the advantages of a second set of eyes.

And as others have mentioned, editing is about so much more than grammar. Can you save up and have it edited? It seems to me that it's better to wait on a release until you can make sure it's 100% polished than to put out something that's not as clean as it could be.

Luis Samways said:

Yeah I here you there, but it can obviously help get rid of silly errors.

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Just curious-is this response meant to be tongue-in-cheek?

Susan Littlefield said:

Just curious-is this response meant to be tongue-in-cheek?

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Good point--- 'here' and 'hear' are vastly different.

ChaosTitan said:

This discussion cropped up recently, but 3 stars is still a decent rating. In most places 3/5 stars is Good. Average. Not Bad But Not Amazing. Don't bemoan a 3 star review.

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Just thought I'd point out, I think this gets perpetuated because Amazon considers a 3-star rating the highest "negative" rating when it separates out positive and negative for the top-rated positive and negative reviews. So that may be part of why people see it as a negative.

I rate most books 3 stars, good ones 4, and ones that have something truly special a 5.

KTC said:

Good point--- 'here' and 'hear' are vastly different.

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Oh, here hear!!

...wait, what?

Keep in mind that you're expecting a reader to PAY for your book. If it's not the best it can be, you're delivering an inferior product that's not worth as much as if it were edited and polished professionally.

Learn from your mistakes and don't do it again. Keep writing and keep LEARNING.

How can I possibly not kick my self for starting this writing thing when my two reviews I have gotten are quite the opposite of what I was hoping for. A five star review would be nice lol

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Reviews do not exist for the benefit of your ego.

I just don't want these reviews to effect my sales

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Reviews do not exist for the benefit of your sales.

Reviews exist so one consumer can tell other, potential consumers whether they thought your product was worth buying. You are not part of that conversation, nor should you be. (To try to game or skew that interaction, between these objective consumers, is a type of financial fraud.)

I know it's a hard pill to swallow, as a writer, but you have to accept that people have a right to their opinions and they have a right to speak them.

And, as a writer, freedom of expression is something you should champion and respect. You wouldn't be able to do what you love very effectively if you didn't have that freedom.

So you have to accept that other people's basic human right to freedom of expression is much, much more important than your hurt feelings or ability to make money. Yes, bad reviews sting, but the people who left them have done nothing wrong, and it wasn't a conversation you were supposed to be eavesdropping on anyway.

Get your validation--your sense of self-worth--from within yourself, not from strangers. You wrote a book! You got it into the market and people are reading it!

That's awesome, and something you should be proud of, full stop.

Luis Samways said:

Yeah I here you there, but it can obviously help get rid of silly errors.

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Susan Littlefield said:

Just curious-is this response meant to be tongue-in-cheek?

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No. Luis is quite right: I here, he there. Or was it he here, me there? Something like that, I'm sure.

(Sorry, Luis. I couldn't resist.)

Bad review?

Suck it up, sweetheart.

No one owes you or any of us ANY reviews, much less good ones.

I've had bad reviews. I've had my books marked DNF.

I just accept that it wasn't their cuppa tea and moved on to the next book. I can't control how others react to my work so why worry? I consider their comments, if they make any, and think about how much weight to give to them.

Then I go back to writing the next book and the next book. I'm grateful for each and every review, even the bad ones. If you take the time to post your review, even DNF, I appreciate it.

And I keep writing.

ChaosTitan said:

This discussion cropped up recently, but 3 stars is still a decent rating. In most places 3/5 stars is Good. Average. Not Bad But Not Amazing. Don't bemoan a 3 star review.

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This. ^

I give most of the books I read 3 stars on Goodreads. 3 stars means I liked it. 3 stars means I'll probably recommend it to my friends. It means I'm not sorry I devoted several hours of my life to it.

I'm not going to feel guilty for giving 3 stars.

Luis Samways said:

It meant a lot to me, and opened my eyes to my mistakes. I know I'm not a brilliant writer (Technically) but I do have stories to tell, and just because I'm indie does not give me the excuse to half ass it. From now on, no matter the cost, I shall invest more time in polishing my work and less time on being naive.

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The good news is that being a good storyteller tends to be a lot tougher than learning to write reasonably proficient prose from what I've seen over the years.

There are also some inexpensive things that can make a big difference. You might consider an online critique group and request help specifically with grammar while you shy away from that and do critiques of others' storytelling. In my experience, such bartering has turned a lot of novice writers into writers with skills capable of cracking trade publishing for no cost, just an investment of time and hard work. The other thing is getting some grammar books (Strunk & White is a great starting point) and self-editing books (Self-Editing for Ficton Writers is kind of the bible) and working through them repeatedly.

While there's no substitute for a good editor, the above can get you pretty far down the path.

Best of luck with it.

Amadan said:

Not to pick on you, but this attitude some authors have that reviewers should decline to review if they didn't like the book really grates on me.

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Just to clarify - I NEVER said they should decline to review if they did not like it. That would be ludicrous. What I said was that they should decline books that are not in their genre. *

I have comes across countless reviewers who clearly state their preferences and most of them also go on to say they will decline books from other genres. This, I find, is fair, objective and respectful. Reviews from them are the ones I would take seriously, regardless of whether or not they liked it.

Just to clarify.

*ETA: I understand what you're saying but I still feel that to review books from genres a reviewer categorically states he/she does not like just makes it unfair for the authors. To each his own. Thanks, Amadan, for your views all the same