I’ve been review bullied on Amazon.
It’s happened to you or someone you know, I’ll bet.
Did they call your opinion ridiculous? Did they pick apart your character description? Did they personally malign you or your intelligence for your opinion of a book?
Reviews are a personal opinion. Someone unabashedly loved or hated a book, was on the fence about it at the end, or was just willing enough to supply feedback.
Feedback is a beautiful gift.
Don’t sully it by inferring that the reviewer doesn’t read that genre, know the author, or write themselves. The person offering a review is a reader and we all love readers. Love it or hate it, don’t attack the reviewer.
If you’re reading this blog post, you probably read independent authors. But on Amazon a strange culture of review bullying arose in the aftermath of self-publishing. An indie author might hop on and explain what the book means, or raise the cry, “This was really hard!! You don’t know what it’s like to create a world!” Hopefully they leave it at that.
How-to-Author-type sites tell writers not to reply, or even read, comments and reviews. Maybe a good idea to know how you’re work’s received, though. Just don’t respond in anger. We authors need to tell our friends and family, our fans and detractors the same thing. Don’t respond to reviews. Don’t get in a fight about someone’s opinion.
Reviewers are rare and wily creatures. If approached without care, reviewers retreat to the wilderness, blending in with their purchasing surroundings and won’t be seen again (at least not on your work of choice).
I seen review bullying in very popular traditional novels, too. Have you seen the strings of comments on negative reviews of this year’s summer blockbuster teen movie’s original book. That’s a mouthful, but you know what I mean. Review bullying is a real problem in indie writing.
If they appear at all reviews might start looking something like this:
“Sorry. I didn’t like every apostrophe you brother’s/wife’s/friend’s book. It wasn’t that I was reading outside my genre, it was that I recognized/didn’t like/expected more from the plot or characters, and thought it needed edited and my honest reply was to warn people that this book was not money well spent. Please don’t hunt me down. I’m a nice person and wanted more from a book.”
Authors, readers, let’s stand together, hand out and filled with books.
“It’s OK. Come here, reviewer. Read this. No one’s going to hurt you. It’s OK. Easy, there. Nice reviewer. We love having you in our world.”
(Have you left your thoughts on a book? You really should, authors live on reviews and caffeine. OK, sometimes chocolate and booze. I won’t hurt you, and neither will most of the good writers out there.)
And authors, you know who you are, please stop telling reviewers you disagree with them. Don’t ask for their address to send money back or tell them other people liked your book. Reviewers can see your reviews for themselves, and they can see how you reply to reviews as well.
Well said Kari. Reviews are hard too hard come by so if authors feel the need to argue, well, they didn’t deserve the review in the first place probably. Serious authors (self-published or not) have to come to terms with the idea that not everyone will love your work and the best way to avoid those uncomfortable situations is to get the best possible feedback before hitting publish. Writing is a business after all! It is sad that these people tarnish the industry for everyone else.
I received a couple of reviews, in the last three months, which made me wince. The first (and worst) I was forced to respond to, as it made claims about me personally, suggesting I was review-tampering (a claim levelled by inference, through the review, at all indies in fact, and which followed the reviewer’s seeming distaste for many self-published work). I would have left it alone, were it not for the fact that the reviewer had taken something I said in an Afterword out of context. I published the full Afterword, explained what I meant by it and thanked him/her for the review. I did not touch the substance of the review at all.
With the other, the reviewer said the plot and characters were well-written and well-crafted, but went on to say the reviewer didn’t like military science fiction or descriptive brutality, and gave it one-star. Reviews are not about personal book preference, but a review of the book itself. It’s like me heading over to the romance section, picking up a book and giving it one-star because I don’t like romance. Of course, I didn’t say anything. Authors should leave reviewers to say what they want to say (within reason) and act professionally. That means never, ever commenting on the substance of a genuine review, good or bad (and, frankly, I wonder whether I’ll ever comment on a trollish review either). Some reviewers like it (Hugh Howey has done it, Evan Currie has done it – both with positive effects) and feel like they are connecting with the author when the author responds to a review, but it seems very dangerous to me. Still, when I’ve been publishing for a long time, maybe I’ll have a better feel for it all.