What to do when you hate the book you are reviewing

 

Image by Jannik Texler from Pixabay

Nobody likes a bad book review, especially the author of the book! But then again, not everybody will love every single book they choose to read. This is also true for the book reviewer – but sometimes, they can’t decide they’re not going to review the book after all. That’s when you need to adjust your book reviewing strategy.

 

Most authors and publishers who send out books to review understand that there is a chance the reviewer will not like the book. Nobody who offered me a review copy ever tore down my door screaming bloody murder because I opted not to review their book after all. What I don’t tell them is that I didn’t like the book, couldn’t finish reading it, or that I hated it. Instead, I say that I’d rather not review the book after all. And, usually, I never hear from them again. Which is fine with me.

 

But if you’re in a position where you MUST review the book even if you hated it, here are some things you can do to get that review written:

 

Write about what you DID like.

I recently stopped reading a collection of short stories I received a free review copy of (I only got this book because I was on somebody’s list of reviewers). I stopped reading it after I noticed I kept passing over a lot of stories that I did not enjoy reading. However, some of the stories in this book were pretty good, so that is something to highlight in a review.

 

Keep your review short.

I have seen very short reviews online. We’re talking reviews that are only one or two sentences. These reviews are usually accompanied by star ratings. Guess what? You don’t HAVE to justify or defend your star rating! If you give a book a two- or three-star rating and add a couple of sentences like “Interesting concept. I think it has potential.” Then be on your way, that is just fine. You did your review.

 

Change how you write your review.

I have noticed some reviewers basically summarize what a book is about. If you must leave a review but you didn’t like the book, try doing this instead.

 

There are a number of ways to handle writing a review for a book that you didn’t like. The above suggestions are just a few strategies you can use.

 

It’s a blessing to book reviewers to have the chance to decline a review or to opt not to review a book that was sent to them, but not all book reviewers are allowed this option. Should you find yourself in such a situation and you don't like the book, figure out a way to write the review that is both fair for you as well as the author of the book.

Rediscovering My Voice as a Book Reviewer

 There’s a page on my website that lists all of the books I have reviewed in the times I have spent as a professional book reviewer. Some of these gigs were paid while some of them are unpaid. (The standard in the book review industry is that the free book offered to the reviewer serves as payment. However, when I have been paid for my reviews, I make attempts to not only turn them in faster, but also to make them as thorough and in-depth as possible. There’s something to be said about getting paid for your time and effort!) What people won’t find on there, though, are reviews I wrote for a publishing company seeking in-house reviews of their books.

 

Maybe that is a good thing, because there was one review I wrote of an author’s book which wasn’t very favorable of her book. And, sadly, she later committed suicide.

 

This news of her death was devastating. I did not know her personally, but I did occasionally communicate with her through social media. Her life was so short and she is still very missed.

 

Meanwhile, I was dealing with a personal issue in relation to her death. I didn’t talk about it openly, because I didn’t want MY problems to interfere with the mourning period her family, friends, associates and fellow authors were going through. But, later on, I did talk about it.

 

And I need to talk about it again here, because things have since changed.

 

For a long time after this author’s suicide, I couldn’t review another book. I felt so terrible about the review I wrote of her book, that I started to wonder if it played a factor in what drove her to end her life. I know it probably didn’t, but that was how I felt at the time. It was awful. I was ravaged by guilt. I even vowed to never review another book again.

 

Well, obviously, that has changed. I did start leaving small reviews of books I read on Amazon. They were all very short reviews and I tried my hardest to make them positive. I gave 5-star reviews to books which I really felt did not deserve five stars, but I was worried that anything less would be hurtful to the author. I just didn’t want to make anything negative of those mini reviews that I wrote.

 

Anyway, after several months of this, I found the strength to publicly share book reviews under my name again. I started a book review blog – first on LiveJournal then on Blogger – and then I decided it was time to review books professionally again. First I tried one online book review service, but the owner was pressuring members to review his book (one which I was not interested in reading!) and the editors of the reviews were rude. Plus, it would be several weeks until the reviews I wrote for them finally appeared on the site – although there is one that I wrote several months ago that was never published. I didn’t stick around there for very long!

 

Then I remembered a site my friend, Carolyn Howard-Johnson, had mentioned in her many communications with me through the years: Reader Views. I checked out the site and liked what I saw. I noticed they even had a presence on social media AND they reviewed self-published books. I decided to give them a try and applied to be a book reviewer. Fortunately, I was accepted. The two ladies operating Reader Views are lovely. They have promptly answered my emails, were always kind and considerate, and the reviews I wrote were promptly included on their site and in their socials. I have been happily reviewing books for them ever since.

 

I don’t know if it was the act of writing those mini reviews that helped me to regain the confidence to write book reviews again, but I know it certainly helped.

 

Also, I have been more mindful of the reviews I write. If I don’t like the book, I won’t review it, even if there is one thing about the book that I DO like. (Thankfully, as an ARC reviewer for a publishing company and some authors I know, I have only received books to review that I actually liked.) But if I don’t like the book, I decline the review. I am grateful that this is an option. I know there are ways to still write a positive review of a book you don’t like, but I’m still not comfortable doing that.

 

And I know I am not doing the authors any favors by giving a 5-star review to books that are not exactly 5-star books. I have since changed that bad habit as well. I’m not so negative with my reviews of books I don’t give five stars to, but at least I am now more comfortable to be more honest about how many stars that I personally feel a book should receive.

 

And “personal” is the keyword here. All reviews of books are just that: a personal opinion about a book. They are not meant to be a way of lashing out at an author or a universal statement about what kind of book this author has written. They are only personal opinions about a book. (Sidenote: This is true in MOST cases. I am aware that there are so-called “book reviewers” out there leaving negative reviews of books simply because of what they know about the book’s content, even if they haven’t read it, or as a means of leaving hateful comments against an author currently in the news for a crime or something similar. There was one author who was accused of killing her child and people left angry and hateful comments about her on Amazon where the reviews go, and another author who was murdered ended up having people who knew her leaving sentimental and thoughtful comments on her book pages on Amazon where reviews are supposed to go.)

 

The bottom line is, not everybody is going to like a book. There WILL be readers out there who don’t like the same book that everybody else likes, and readers that do.

 

As to that one author, I DID like her book. The only thing I pointed out were certain mistakes she made about things in her story (they weren’t writing mistakes; they were mistakes about certain items the characters used). But overall, the story itself was good. And I think that as long as the author manages to tell a good story that readers enjoy, then a mistake or two in their story doesn’t really matter.  

On writing bad reviews

When I started reviewing books on the Internet, I never once thought that it might be a good idea to use a pseudonym. On one level, I no longer use a pseudonym because I feel it is like I am ashamed of what I am writing. On another level, I won’t use one because, in the past, I’ve had to defend that I WAS indeed the author of something written under a pseudonym and I just don’t want to go there anymore. However, as I have written book reviews for quite some time now, I am beginning to think that maybe a pseudonym would have been useful for when I have to write a bad review of a book.

Being an author myself, I know that reviewing books on a public forum places me in a position where an author unhappy with my review of his/her book would lash out at me via a bad review of one of my own books on Amazon.com or something. Yes, this kind of behavior is childish and unprofessional, but it can and probably does happen.

Also, as an author, I know how painful a bad review of my book can be. I work so hard on my books and take them through several edits, revisions and critiques until they are satisfactory. And my editors have worked their magic, as well, God bless ‘em. But a bad review of one of my books is inevitable – it goes with the territory – and I know it would be a little hard to swallow. Still, I respect that reviewer’s opinions. I won’t respond to bad reviews and I will acknowledge that you just can’t please everybody. Really, you can’t.

I hope that a certain author will think the same thing when my review of his book is posted online. Unfortunately, I didn’t like the book. At all. I TRIED to like it and I even actually pointed out the novel’s one strength. But I just didn’t like it, and so my review of this book is not a very positive one. In fact, I’m giving it one star when I turn the review in. But I hope that people won’t see that one star and think they should avoid reading that book. Reading my review will clue them in as to why I didn’t like it. I tried to be restrained with my opinions. I tried to still be nice even though I called his book “filth” and “brain poison.” I still felt terrible writing a bad review. I don’t like writing bad reviews. Believe me, if I had the choice of passing on reviewing the book in order to avoid writing a bad review, I would have done so. But I HAD to read this book because it is a print copy, and I HAD to review it.

If only I had that pseudonym handy….

This reminded me of the scene in that movie Ratatouille, where the food critic struggles to write his review after he learns the chef who prepared his food was a rat. What can we do? What do we say? How can we say it without hurting anyone or anything?

I really struggled with this. How could I write this review without making it seem like this book isn’t worth anybody’s time? And how could I say the things in my review that I wanted to say? This was a Hugo Award winning author, after all! Who was I to say such things about his latest creation?

But, I have to remember that it is my job to review the novel. To only share my opinions about it – and it is just ONE person’s opinion! I am not trying to say the author sucks. I am not trying to put him down or put down his other work. I actually haven’t read his other books and they may be good stuff! What I am trying to do is share my opinions of this particular novel. Not this particular author. Just THIS particular novel.

I don’t like writing a bad review. I’ve done it before and I felt terrible after the review was posted. (And that review was actually the watered-down version of what I REALLY wrote.) But I took on this role as book reviewer and, in some cases, there are times I cannot pass on reviewing a book which I find distasteful or unappealing. These are the times I must swallow that lump in my throat and share what I think about that book. Not that author, just that book.

Perhaps in future I would do well to review ebooks instead of print. At least in that case, should I want to pass on reviewing a book, I will be allowed to do so.

The 5 W’s and H of a Product Review

Recently, I had the opportunity to write a product review. I was contacted by a friend of a lady who had created a new device for parents and she was looking for reviewers. Being a parent, and curious to see if this new item would be easy for a disabled parent to use, I agreed to it. Sometime after I received this product, I held a review session for it, took numerous photographs, then wrote up a review. After I took my review through revisions, I submitted it, only to realize later that I left out one important piece of information.

When thinking about this information, I realized it was just one ingredient in the “5 W’s and H” that journalists use when writing their story: Who, What, Where, When, Why and How. And, as my journalism instructor added to this combination, S, for Source.

In this case, I left out the “where.”

With this in mind, I decided I should write up this information and use it for future reference, just in case I am once again approached to review some product or another. Currently, I review books, but obviously I am open to reviewing other items.

What is it? What is this item I am reviewing? The reader cannot see it, hold it, or feel it. So I need to explain what exactly it is.

How does it work? The reviewer is the reader’s eyes, ears and hands (and, in some cases, even their taster). Show the reader how a product is used and how it can be helpful or entertaining. Explain every step of using this product (in my case, how to set it up), and how the reader can use it.

Who made it? What is the name of the person who created this product? If it is a movie, who is in it? Who directed it? Give some background on this person and their motivation for creating this product.

When was it made and when will it be available? If the item is brand new, be sure to indicate as much. If it’s been around for a while but not widely available, include this information, as well, and, if possible, why it was not available until now.

Why should I buy it? This is the one question many readers of reviews have in the front of their minds. Why should they buy this product? Why is it important to tell them about it? Why should they even care?

Where can I buy it? If it’s available through retail stores, online stores such as Amazon.com, and through grocery outlets, be sure to let readers know. Indicate if this is something they will need to special order at a store. If the product is sold exclusively through a Web site, include the full URL. Additionally, try to include snail mail contact info for the product’s creator, just in case someone reading the review is unable to order directly from the creator’s Web site. (Keep in mind that there are still A LOT of people out there who are A: Too nervous to buy products online. And B: Don’t have a computer, Internet connection or PayPal account to shop online with.)

When you write a review, you want to tell your readers about this amazing product you are writing about (whether it’s a book, video, or restaurant dish), but it’s important to cover all the bases. Using the 5 W’s and H in newspaper writing can ensure that everything a reader needs to know about a product is in that review. The next time I write a product review, I’ll be sure to use them just so I won’t have to send my editor two different drafts of a review.