When are people going to start reviewing?

[Frida Fantastic]

Originally Posted by Aladyleyna

Cool, I've never thought of it that way. Here I was thinking that reviews were meant to be read by the author!

I run a weekly speculative fiction ebook review blog (cross-posting on Amazon, Smashwords, and Goodreads), and I also write fanfic on fanfiction.net (man, how much more nerdy can I get? I do play outside. Sometimes.)

Fanfiction.net reviews
Fanfiction.net reviews are different from Amazon/Smashwords/Goodreads. Fanfiction.net's reviews are really informal encouragement or critique for the author, but the raw review numbers (This has been reviewed 100 times!) tells other readers whether the fic is worthwhile to read or not. A lot of it is feedback written by amateurs for other amateurs (which I think has it's own place) and it's generally more emotional (I loved this scene, this was funny, etc.) than constructive.

Reviews on Amazon/Smashwords/Goodreads, on the other hand, are for other readers, essentially answering the question "Who should read/purchase this book?" I see it as a professional and finished product. I know writing is a collaborative process, but I think that's for the writer's critique and beta circle to handle, not for the general public.

Book reviews
The general public takes a while to respond to stuff. I never reviewed books beyond a short paragraph on Goodreads until I started my ebook review blog. Now I write reviews for indie books at least once a week, and the word count tends to end up somewhere between 500-1000 words. I keep it up because blogs that update regularly are taken more seriously.

Like Anke and Ficbot, I see book reviews as tools to inform other readers. Reviews are a record of subjective reactions to a book. For me, helpful reviews address the following:

(1) What kind of book is this?
(2) What are its strengths?
(3) What are its weaknesses?
(4) Who would I recommend it to?

There's a lot of books out there, and as a reader, I want to know if the book is likely to connect with me or not, because not all books are for everyone. One-line reviews that say "This is a wonderful book!" are emotional reactions that don't say who the target audience is, so I'm specific with both my praise and criticism.

Beta Feedback
Book reviews are different from beta feedback, or at least the ones I write. I haven't done that much betaing, but I've betaed a horror screenplay that's being produced by an indie film company, and I'm in the process of betaing a scifi indie book. Book reviews are to be read by a public that chooses to buy or not to buy, so it's important that each word delivers the right impression. It shouldn't be more glowing or more critical than it should be.

For betaing, I don't care about that glowing/critical balance. They're private comments for the author and/or other betas to follow up on. I give some praise, but I dive down to the critical nitty-gritty. "This character motivation isn't convincing", "This turn of events has unfortunate implications that people could read a lot into", "You don't need this scene." Authors don't need betas for ego-boosts, that's what fan emotional reactions are for. Betas are for pointing out problems. Or maybe I'm just a menacing beta

How to get more reviews
I second anamardoll's post. I add looking into some indie book bloggers http://www.simon-royle.com/indie-reviewers/ Many cross-post to Amazon/Smashwords/Goodreads/etc. They can take a while to respond back, but you know what sort of review to expect from them.

[odiakkoh]

I never thought of reviewing books until I joined MR and started reading indie books. I started leaving reviews at Smashwords if they only have 0-3 reviews but anymore than that and I don't bother since I suck at writing reviews anyway.

[VydorScope]

I would love to replay to some of my bad reviews, in a polite fashion to get clarification on what they mean by their points. I have even emailed one as a test cast to see what may come of it... no reply.

My book has good average rattings... but those that complain seem to be clustering around one point. It would be nice to get some clarification on that point, but I usually do not see responding to people that dislike your work going well so I avoid it.

[Frida Fantastic]

Originally Posted by VydorScope

My book has good average rattings... but those that complain seem to be clustering around one point. It would be nice to get some clarification on that point, but I usually do not see responding to people that dislike your work going well so I avoid it.

I think responding to people is okay as long as you do it in private and you don't come off as defensive. If you come across like you genuinely want to learn about their experience, then people should be fairly receptive. Not everyone is going to respond, but I think you'll get some responses. Just don't do it in public.

[mr ploppy]

It's not just psychotic writers you need to be wary of. A lot of people take umbrage at this review, even though it's quite a positive one.

http://marcusblakeston.wordpress.com...richard-allen/

[Kevin2960]

Yes I agree wholeheartedly and think it is difficult to review, OP Readers may not also be Authors and a Reader may not feel they have the eloquence or the intelligence and education to pass comment,

Also most Reader's on this site read an awful lot of books, would you rather they were spending thier precious free time reviewing rather than Reading, most people read for pleasure, writing endless reviews is likely to make it a chore, and turn them off of reading,

Don't get me wrong, I am a big supporter of reviewing, I'm not good at it, but I do it to give back to the community I have found here on MR, but the truth is I'm never that comfortable doing reviews,

Plus a Reader has bought your book, paid out thier hard earned cash, can you really expect them to then also work for it by reviewing the book, Don't expect the reviews, just learn to make the most from those you do get,

I'm sure reviews will come,

Originally Posted by Aladyleyna

In most cases, especially on places like Smashwords, I don't dare to review because I'm afraid that I'm not professional enough. I do review the books on my blog though (or at least, am trying to, provided I am disciplined enough to do so), but not on the site itself. I guess I'm afraid that I don't really know much about what makes a book good and so on in a professional way.

But I do review from time to time on fanfiction.net though, because at least I know the writers there are of the same standard as me. But for professional writers though? Too scary.

[Aladyleyna]

I remember that. A classic example of how not to respond to a review. I wouldn't mind, but the original review was quite good, and her writing was quite bad.

Heh, reminds me of those times when I used to review on fanfiction.net. It's somewhat okay for them since they're in their teens, though I guess it's a good thing that they're made aware that if they want to be professional authors, they will have to get used to criticism. However, for professional authors to behave so... unprofessionally, it's a bit weird.

[Frida Fantastic]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

It's not just psychotic writers you need to be wary of. A lot of people take umbrage at this review, even though it's quite a positive one.

http://marcusblakeston.wordpress.com...richard-allen/

That's ridiculous. It is weird when professional writers can't keep it together. Opinions are just opinions. If writers get bad reviews, if they really can't stand it, they should just ignore it and move on. Get more readers to read it and hopefully the good reviews will flood in. If the good reviews aren't coming in, well, the writer has something to fix.

[Harper Kingsley]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

It's not just psychotic writers you need to be wary of. A lot of people take umbrage at this review, even though it's quite a positive one.

http://marcusblakeston.wordpress.com...richard-allen/

I don't even know what to say to this one... The review was pretty straight forward and actually put a lot of thought into a book that I otherwise wouldn't have been interested in. But the way he describes things makes me honestly curious to find out if I would see the same things in the story that he saw.

The guy that responded to his review left me saying "Whut?" because that kind of came from left field.

[VydorScope]

Originally Posted by VydorScope

Now if anyone ever asked me to review their book for a blog or etc, I probably would do it. But that has not happened yet...

Soooo someone just took me up on this LOL. If this becomes a normal thing I'll have to consider creating a section of one of my various web sites for book reviews.

[EileenG]

And an interesting thing is that bad reviews on Amazon tend to push sales up as much as good ones do. A book with all five star reviews looks as if you get all your relatives to go and say nice things about it. A few bad reviews prove that real people are reading it.

[VydorScope]

So you want me to go put up a 1 star review to help your sales? LOL

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by EileenG

And an interesting thing is that bad reviews on Amazon tend to push sales up as much as good ones do. A book with all five star reviews looks as if you get all your relatives to go and say nice things about it. A few bad reviews prove that real people are reading it.

I think that's more a result of how Amazon's sytems work. If a few people buy something it will get more prominence than something that nobody has bought for months. And the more people that buy it the more it gets cross-promoted. I don't think negative reviews have any affect on that sort of promotion, it's only sales that count.

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by EileenG

And an interesting thing is that bad reviews on Amazon tend to push sales up as much as good ones do. A book with all five star reviews looks as if you get all your relatives to go and say nice things about it. A few bad reviews prove that real people are reading it.

I think so to, and also a well-written bad review can help people decide to buy it. For instance, I've reviewed books where I basically said, "I didn't like this book because of X, Y, and Z elements," and other people who LIKE X, Y, and Z have read that and told me, "Thanks, that helped me decide to buy it!"

[VydorScope]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

I think that's more a result of how Amazon's sytems work. If a few people buy something it will get more prominence than something that nobody has bought for months. And the more people that buy it the more it gets cross-promoted. I don't think negative reviews have any affect on that sort of promotion, it's only sales that count.

It does in a away I think...

If your avg review is 4 and you have 100 reviews (mix of good and bad), and my average review is 4... but all I have is 3 4 star reviews, then I am pretty sure you are ranked much higher then I am when sorted by user reviews.

Most of their lists are by best selling by default I think so books on the rise do better as they rise, and worse if they slip.