Quote:
Originally Posted by QuantumIguana
For fiction, what I care about is whether or not I will like the book. What other readers think might be an indication of whether or not I would like it. An professional reviewer might simply be extolling the virtues of the emperor's new clothes.
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I find fiction reviews to be very problematic, both those in dedicated magazines like the New York Review of Books and fellow consumer-reader reviews like those found at B&N or Amazon, for the very reason you state: What I care about is whether I will like the book.
I think part of my problem is that I consider fiction to be disposable; that is, read once, then delete (or if a pbook, put in my library never to be opened again). In contrast, nonfiction books tend to be read and consulted (I buy nonfiction only in hardcover so it can be added to my library and opened again in the future). But my experience with consumer-reader reviews is that the reviews rarely ever give me a clue as to whether I will like the novel. Most of the reviews are superficial ("great book" "outstanding" "couldn't put it down" etc.) and those that are more in-depth are unable to communicate whether I will like the novel.All they seem capable of communicating is whether the plot appeals to me, which is different than whether the writing appeals.
I expect nonfiction to be drier, more "academic" in writing style, so what matters most to me is whether the content is of interest. With fiction, however, both content and writing style are of equal importance to me and it is nearly impossible to convey writing style.
It is largely because of this inability to convey writing style quality that I am reluctant to pay much (not more than 99 cents) for an initial read of an unknown-to-me indie author and why my ebook library is so largely populated with free ebooks whose plots appeal to me.