I can recall my first 'bad' review back when I was 5 years old or so. I had drawn a picture of a Chinese boat and showed it to my Ma. She looked it over and made a comment about 'Junk'.
I was devastated. Crushed. Hurt beyond words! I worked so hard on that picture, and the one whom I was trying to impress the most had called it 'Junk'!
I found out after my total meltdown, that Chinese boats were actually called 'Junks'
Oops.
It still hurt like a bitch though.
Bad reviews hurt, and they hurt real bad. Some are legitimate, some exist primarily to crush your spirit, and some are just downright confusing.
 |
| Wait...you admittedly don't like Vampires, but you read 'Vampire Beach Blanket Bonanza' anyway? The Hell? |
But not all bad reviews are 'bad', some can give legitimate critiques that you can learn from, to grow as an Author, to help you put a finer edge on your work. That's not to say that they still don't hurt, someone is still saying negative things about your 'baby'. Just treat these as advice from a concerned Grandparent.
 |
| "Oh Dear, your narrative prose is as dry as my Christmas turkey...you need some gravy." |
Next, we'll cover the 'bogus' reviews, these are pretty easy to spot with a trained eye. These reviews are posted by someone who has nothing better to do than kick sand in your face. They'll eviscerate you mercilessly, and say horrible, horrible things. But you may notice that these reviews contain barely, if any, references to anything contained in your book. Goodreads is notorious for it's Troll Population. They allow 'reviewers' to do reviews without any confirmation that they actually read it, and the Trolls take full advantage of this.
Case In Point: Somewhere along the line, I must have REALLY upset 'Mike' (Imagine that.). He gave every single one of my releases One Star, even the ones no longer in print! Further investigation revealed that 'Mike' had only ever reviewed MY books. If you receive what you believe is a 'bogus' review, do some digging and you'll likely find it to be a personal attack for some reason or another. Dismiss these reviews, everybody else will. Seasoned Authors and Readers can spot these a mile away.
 |
| Artist's Rendition. |
Now that we've discussed bad reviews and ways to deal with them, now we can shift gears and discuss a good way to (maybe) prevent them.
Editing.
Whether you're fortunate enough to be able to afford one, or like many of us, have to do it yourself. Editing is an absolute necessity. But it's not an absolute one-stop save-all though. I've caught a few errors in even Stephen King's books, and you can imagine what HIS editors must rake in.
If many of your bad reviews have to do with 'editing' issues, perhaps it's time to either A: Let someone else do it, or B: Get a better editor.
Recently, a certain pretentious douchebag that shall remain nameless...
 |
| ^He kinda looks like this. |
Stated that Editors changed the voice of the Author, thereby, making the finished work not entirely the Author's...
Just let the stupidity of that remark sink in for a moment.
Are you fully basted yet? Good. Carrying on.
That statement came from an 'Author' that proudly admitted that he's never used an Editor, and holy Hell does it shine through in his work.
Think of Editors as the 'Personal Trainers' of the literary world. The Authors do the bulk of the work, while the Editor is there to help you along, keep you motivated, and generally to 'tone you up'.
If your Editor starts doing the lifting for you, it's time to get another one.
Keep in mind that getting a good Editor doesn't guarantee that your finished product will be absolutely flawless, even the Great Ones put out 'flawed' work, despite their Editors being extremely well compensated.
So, the short and skinny of this ramble is learn from the 'critical' reviews and ignore the 'Troll' reviews.
As for the confusing ones? I wish I could help with that, I'm still trying to figure them out myself.
No comments:
Post a Comment