Why I Don’t Read Reviews
By Juliet Marillier | February 3, 2011 |
I try not to read reviews of my own books, especially when they appear on sites where anyone at all can express an opinion. Although an author develops a thicker skin as each new book is published, her hide is not so impenetrable that negative feedback simply bounces off. Bad reviews, professional or amateur, still hurt.
But then, shouldn’t a writer take readers’ opinions on board for future reference? Shouldn’t she be robust enough to deal with the tough love that reviewers dish out? How can we ever improve if we don’t let people tell us what we did wrong?
Writing is a journey that lasts our whole lives, and on that journey there is always something more to learn. We can keep on improving our craft, developing our storytelling, trying out new techniques and polishing the old ones every day until we die. I seek feedback actively, from my critiquing buddies while the manuscript is in progress, and from beta readers when it’s finished. If their advice works for me, I act on it. Even so, I’m never 100% satisfied when a book is done. That can make posting on Writer Unboxed a challenge, since the WU community loves meaty craft posts including ‘how to’ writing advice!
Sure, we learn from our mistakes, in life as in writing. But the place to go for useful advice is not Amazon or Good Reads reviews. Nor will we find it in emails sent to us by readers keen either to praise without reservations or to list every way we disappointed them. Why not?
Firstly, the people who comment in this way are not seasoned professional reviewers. They are protected by the anonymity of the internet, and they are expressing a personal opinion, no more. Regular bloggers are a bit different – many write well, have background in the field and argue their points logically, supported by examples. I still avoid reading their opinions on my work. Too much feedback is a dangerous thing. It can eat away at a writer’s confidence and kill her passion for the next project. At its worst it can paralyse creative endeavour. Besides, the book that’s being reviewed is already out there. It’s the next book that needs me, and I need my self-belief so I can get on with writing it.
What about professional reviews, the ones in the respected journals or on highly-regarded review sites? Those I do often see, because my editors draw them to my attention. If they were uniformly negative in their comments about one of my novels, or if a lot of them were critical of the same aspect of a particular book, that would give me pause for thought. But ultimately, the artistic decisions I make about my work come only from me (and a little bit from my editor.) I have a story to tell, and I tell it with what I believe is the best combination of craft and imagination for that particular story.
Seer of Sevenwaters was well reviewed in mainstream publications. One or two made comments about slowish pacing in the earlier part, or thought it was too heavy on back story. I thought there was some truth in those comments and was not upset by them. Feedback from the vast majority of readers was also positive. That included some analytical and well-supported discussion, especially from readers who were moved by the elements of illness and healing in the story.
But a few readers were infuriated by the book. They didn’t pick on technical aspects of the writing, such as my choice to use dual first person point of view or present tense, but took issue with the plot. Seems my female protagonist, who had appeared as a child in previous Sevenwaters novels, made some life decisions these readers thought (a) sent a message of disempowerment to young female readers and (b) were not true to the way the character had previously been portrayed. There was a clear expectation that I would read and digest the opinions and take them on board for future novels.
My policy these days is not to defend my work online. Sometimes I have no choice but to read reviews and discussions because people send them directly to me and I am too polite to ignore them. I could answer the criticisms point by point, explaining why I wrote the story the way I did. But that would consume time and emotional energy that I prefer to channel into writing the next book.
Neil Gaiman once said something along the lines that a great percentage of a book is created, not by the writer, but by the reader. Each reader brings his or her own imagination to the story. What each reader sees and understands is different. And if a reader has a sufficiently different mindset from mine, she may not understand why I wrote that novel the way I did. If my story did not work for her, on some level it failed. But if I had written the story the way she wanted, I would not have pleased all those readers who were moved and entertained and delighted by the story I did write.
NOTE: Please keep comments spoiler-free.
Photo credit: © Dietmar Höpfl | Dreamstime.com
Juliet Marillier has written twenty-four novels for adults and young adults and two collections of short fiction. Her works of historical fantasy have been published around the world and have won numerous awards. Juliet’s most recent series was Warrior Bards, of which the third and final book, A Song of Flight, was published in 2021. Her collection of reimagined fairy tales, Mother Thorn and Other Tales of Courage and Kindness, had its trade release in 2022. Mother Thorn is illustrated by Kathleen Jennings and published by Serenity Press.
Juliet is currently working on a two-book fantasy series. The first book in this duology, The Amber Owl, will be published by New Dawn in February 2025.
When not writing, Juliet looks after a small crew of rescue dogs.
John Grisham said: “There’s a lot of jealousy, because [reviewers] think they can write a good novel or a best-seller and get frustrated when they can’t. As a group, I’ve learned to despise them.” The editor-in-chief of Simon & Schuster, and a novelist in his own right, Michael Korda, said, “I have never had the slightest respect for critics or any degree of interest in their opinions, despite my own sideline as a film critic. . .” And the wonderful writer, Jean Shepherd, puts it this way: “What is a book review but merely an overblown book report? And we all half suspect that, like our book reports of our dim past, the book reviewers rarely bother actually to read the books. We instinctively admire their suave fakery, their artful dodging, their expansive self-congratulatory phraseology, their mellifluous padding. We have been through it, too, and we know good trickery when we see it.“
Just what I needed to hear today! You are so right about focusing the emotional energy on the work in progress.
We all write every day, whether it’s e-mails, grocery lists or novels…doesn’t make us experts. Funny that (generally speaking) when we hear a recording of our singing voices we cringe, but our written words are the greatest thing since Joyce. Our doodling is obviously not fine art.
For a great take on critics, listen to Pete Townsend’s ‘Jules and Jim’.
I’m as yet unpublished, and wouldn’t know. But I wonder if here’s a case to be made that the emotional outlet provided by reviewing online can help to deflect some of the negativity an author can be subjected to. Is it satisfying enough for one so disgruntled to vent in an Amazon or GoodReads review?
And then, conversely, when more recognized critics pick on someone’s work, for whatever the reason(s), can the collective voices of those for whom it resonates be heard?
In my own limited experience, criticism has shaped me as a writer. But caring critiques are an altogether different thing than simply spewing venom, as some seem intent upon. I believe you’re wise to be selective in subjecting yourself to what’s out there, Juliet.
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Nobody likes to hear their baby is ugly. If you write for the library market, your book lives and dies by reviews by the Big Four. And it’s irritating as all get out to read reader reviews on Amazon where you wonder if the reviewer actually read the book you wrote.
But it’s about the writing. After all, someone thought your book was good enough to get published, right?
Terry
Terry’s Place
Romance with a Twist–of Mystery
Thank goodness for WU and for your decision to tackle this topic today, Juliet. My reviews for The Kitchen Daughter are just starting to come in, and I’m eagerly reading every one of them as they happen, but I can already see the drawbacks of watching too closely (one blogger got the title wrong and I had to work hard to refrain from correcting her). I know a lot of author friends who have a loved one read the reviews for them and only share what’s valuable, but you raise a good question — what’s valuable at all? The book is out there already. It’s not like a critique group. I guess we all have to arrive at our own relationship with reviews and I just haven’t figured mine out yet. But it really helps to hear how other authors feel.
I hadn’t heard the term “Big Four” before — I assume it’s Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and then — maybe Library Journal and Booklist?
Great post, and one every writer, published or not, should read…and read…and read. When my debut novel was offered as a free Kindle download, some people posted Amazon reviews trashing it because of its genre. Not the writing but the fact that it dealt with something they didn’t particularly like to read. Hello! You got it for nothing. Move on.I wanted to post a rebuttal for these comments, but bit my tongue and kept my fingers off the keys. Glad to see you’ve adopted that stance as well.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for sharing this first-hand experience on the review aspect of being a writer.
Patricia
PM_Poet Writer
Very well said, Juliet, and it’s exactly why I don’t read reviews, either. By the time my books are published, I’ve done my absolute best to tell the story the very best way I can–otherwise I wouldn’t have let the book go off into the world. If a reader hates it, well, then, it obviously just wasn’t the story for her, and that’s perfectly okay, I don’t love every story I read, either. Reading is like dating–two great individual people may just not have the right chemistry to be a couple, and the same with a reader and a book. Doesn’t mean there was anything wrong with the book or the reader, just that they didn’t click.
Great post, Juliet! Between my first and second novels, the number of traditional reviewers has dropped, and those reader reviews have seemed to become much more important. I have to confess that I read them all, though I may rethink this after your post. When I hear a criticism repeatedly, I pay attention, but I never respond. I actually like strong opinions. Of course I prefer it when they’re favorable, but I sometimes get a kick out of the bad ones. At least they’re reading. What drives me crazy is when I can tell that the reader hasn’t read the book. It’s hard not to respond to those reviews.
Great post – I stopped reading my reviews after I realized that they didn’t help me improve my writing and the bad ones didn’t do anything for my self-confidence as a writer. I’ve noticed that on Amazon, several writers who I consider fabulous authors have gotten such awful reviews for their latest books that I strongly suspect the reviews were written by either people who have a personal or professional ax to grind or just plain old nutcases.
I recently put my first chapter up on my blog, and an old school friend took it upon himself to write an “honest” and utterly devastating critique of it. His opinion really shouldn’t have mattered in the scheme of things, but it was a hard blow to come back from. (Some of my thoughts here on feedback, after dealing with that experience! https://superaniistar.wordpress.com/2011/01/28/on-feedback/)
I think blog reviews are really for other readers, not so much for writers.
the book that’s being reviewed is already out there. It’s the next book that needs me, and I need my self-belief so I can get on with writing it.
I totally agree. And nasty voices have a way of echoing around in a skull for a long time, once they’re inside. Better never to let them in.
My friends who’ve been published who seem to thrive, no matter what their stats or reviews say, seem to have developed this forward-thinking, present-book approach. I really appreciate getting ideas about how to cope.
Fabulous post – thank you! I recently experienced this and I had to figure out how to deal with it. And then I realized all I can do is tell the story I have to tell and if a reader is disappointed because they had different expectations, well, that is out of my control.
Neil Gaiman is right, and this is why people have such different opinions on books! I can’t even count the number of times a friend has interpreted a book differently from me, and our differences were usually because of the opinions, viewpoints, and experiences we were bringing into the reading experience. In all cases, it’s likely neither of us were reading the story exactly as the author intended it.
To a certain degree, reading reviews is a useless exercise because the book is already out there. If there is a universal criticism, perhaps that could be kept in mind for the next book–but one would hope one’s editor would have caught something that outstanding before the book went to print anyway.
I’m extremely impressed by your restraint. I don’t have the restraint not to read them, and I obsess over them.
And yes, that was a double negative you critics.
You’ve made some excellent points. You do the best you can with a book then send it out into the world and let destiny take it where it will…much as you do with a child…
‘I actually like strong opinions. Of course I prefer it when they’re favorable, but I sometimes get a kick out of the bad ones. At least they’re reading.’
Great point, Brunonia. I did note that my novel had aroused passionate responses both pro and con, and I deduced that it had made readers think and feel. That’s a good thing!
Juliet, I remember a brief discussion you and I had once about which characters we did and didn’t like in Dorothy Dunnett’s works. We both had different views and therein lies the real difficulty. People’s opinions are ALWAYS subjective, no matter how experienced and academic the reviewer might be or how objective they think they are.
Because reviews ARE subjective, in the larger picture how can they be relevant?
I think your editor and (after this length of time) your own gut feeling are all that matters. That said, I adored Seer of Sevenwaters!
Great post.
I was wondering if you thought it best to avoid reviewing books we read on Amazon.com or GoodReads, if we are not professional reviewers. Sometimes, I can be a bit “too” honest, and I do not want to discourage other authors.
M.E., I’m certainly not saying readers should not put up reviews on those sites, or that any reviewer should be less than honest. I’d only ask that reviewers be well-informed, that they attempt to give a balanced view, and that they support their opinions with examples. Writers can make their own decisions on whether to look at those reviews or not.
Oh, Juliet, thank you! I wish had your strength, but I’m fatally drawn to the damn things. Although my hide is getting thicker, some of them still manage to drain me better than any vampire. I never, ever, respond, but I shall try harder to refrain from the poisoned chalice from now on.
The best, BTW, was someone on Goodreads who put up a 2 star review of a book that wasn’t yet available in any format. You have to wonder…
Juliet, a wonderful post. I love this quote:
“Neil Gaiman once said something along the lines that a great percentage of a book is created, not by the writer, but by the reader. Each reader brings his or her own imagination to the story.”
I would take this one step further–that once the story is created, it doesn’t even belong to the writer, but to the reader. I know I am possessive of the books I love, and as a writer, I must be willing to let go of my work to let readers make of it what they will.
It’s wonderful that these sites exist and readers can talk to each other and have a dialogue about books, but it’s not my place as the writer to be involved.
“the book that’s being reviewed is already out there. It’s the next book that needs me, and I need my self-belief so I can get on with writing it.”
I know I’m late responding to this but, Juliet, this sentence is so true. I heard someone (an actor, Jesse Eisenberg, of all people) also say something that I thought was so true regarding one’s work in a creative field (he was speaking of acting, but it struck me as true for writing): He avoids reviews because “no compliment is ever sufficient, and every insult is true.”
I can read 100 positive things about something I’ve written the five negatives , and while the positives are nice, there’s never a permenancy to them. It’s somehow the negative comments I’ll remember. I take feedback seriously from people I trust, but even that I need to have a fluid relationship with. Ultimately, the person I write for is myself and that’s who I have to please. If other people like it, great, but I have to like it first.
I’m a bit late to the party, but just thought I’d chime in with an Amazon reviewer’s perspective.
I’ve been reviewing for a couple of years now; no, I’m not a published writer, but I’m a lifelong reader who loves to talk about books. My average star rating for a book is 3.63 on a 1-5 scale: so, I tend toward the positive (because I seek out books I expect to like), but I will write a thoughtful 1-2 star review when I believe it’s appropriate.
Juliet, I totally support your decision not to read online reviews; when I write them, I don’t expect authors to read them, much less take them to heart. My audience is prospective readers: people who are trying to decide whether or not they want to read the book. When I’m deciding to read something, I find well-written reader reviews extremely helpful in making my reading decisions (I personally find professional reviews much less so, for reasons I can elaborate on if anyone would like). And I’ve gotten positive feedback online and in real life from people who feel the same way. I do try my best to be balanced: whether I’m giving a 1-star, a 3-star or a 5-star review, I’ll mention both positive and negative aspects of a book, although obviously not in the same proportion!
Of course, it’s easy to focus on the worst examples of online reviewers: people who obviously have an axe to grind, who obviously didn’t read the book, who post poorly-spelled rants and so on. But in most cases these reviews will be voted unhelpful anyway (I certainly vote against them when I run across them). But there are also many examples of honest, helpful (to customers) reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, across all star ratings. As an author I imagine it’s easy to see all critical reviews as angry and vengeful, but really, many of us are just honest people who were disappointed in a book and want to help other customers make informed decisions.
If you spend much time in reviewing communities, you will run across some people who criticize amateur reviews. First, for not being professionals (answer: so why are readers less qualified to share their opinions of a book, provided they can do so in an articulate, thoughtful fashion? Thousands of people out there do find such reviews helpful, after all). And second, you’ll see some people who choose never to post critical reviews. That’s their decision to make, but I personally believe strongly that a reviewer–whether she posts on Amazon or writes for the New York Times or anything in between–shouldn’t sugercoat things or refrain from posting a review simply because she didn’t like the book. After all, part of helping people find books they’ll like is helping them avoid books they won’t. I would be doing customers a disservice if, on the occasion that I waste my time reading a real 1-star stinker, I didn’t warn other people away from it. Of course, tastes are subjective and plenty of people out there will love books I hate and vice versa. But that’s the beauty of sites like Amazon and Goodreads: there’s a whole mix of reviews of all star ratings, so customers can read a handful and make their own decisions.
But if only glowing reviews were out there, the sites would be useless–they’d help boost the authors’ egos, but there would be no counterbalance to help us make informed decisions. I think sometimes authors worry that customers will pay attention to the negative reviews and not the others, but that’s not the case with people like me who regularly use reader reviews: in fact, sometimes critical reviews help convince me that I want to read a book. In any case, I know if there are enough reviews on a site, some will be critical–it would be odd if they weren’t–and I decide how much weight to give them after reading a variety.
I realize I’ve written an essay here, but really just wanted to say: I understand why Amazon or Goodreads reviews can be unhelpful to an author. They’re quite helpful to me as a reader though, and I’ve been able to help many other readers. After all, so many books out there, so little time…. one way or another we have to make decisions. I think I’ve steered a fair number of customers toward your books, too, Juliet, if voting on reviews is any indication!