How I Rate the Books I Read

As book bloggers rating a book is what we do every day. We all have different rating systems and also different opinions. It’s clear that we all rate the books we read in a different way and that’s also good. I came up with this post to explain what I feel when I rate the books and how I decide what rating to give.

When reading a book and especially towards the end I get a feeling about the rating pretty fast, is it more of a 4 or even a 5?! When I can’t get into a book I’m always around a 3 and then it can go up or down with the rating in the end.

There are signs for me, who make a rating clearer. There are books I can’t put down and I never look at the page number or the percentage. Looking at the page number is always a bit of a bad sign for me, it means that I’m not totally into the story and that I can not focus on the book.

Another sign is the storyline. Am I able to say what the story is about and what really happens in the story?! If it’s a yes, it’s a good sign. The same with the characters, if I’m able to really understand the characters, relate to them and also tell someone about  certain characters it’s a really good sign. It means that I like the storyline/characters and that I enjoy being in their world.

How do I feel when I’m reading a book? This is really an indicator of what the story means to you. I always look at the way I feel after finishing a book. If I’m full of emotions (sad or happy) then It’s a good sign, so the rating will be high.

Of course book hangovers are the clearest indicator. If you can’t stop thinking about a story, the couple and the characters then for me it’s a 5 sea shells rating with an extra starfish.

For me every book has the chance to reach 5 stars, I don’t have my favourite book on top and compare every book to that one, that wouldn’t be fair and as you all know anyway, I have a lot of favourite books. When I started reviewing I did a lot of comparing. “Oh, I rated this book 4.5, so this one can only be a 4.” I don’t do that anymore, the feeling and the my emotions are more important now.

I feel very comfortable with the traditional 1 to 5 stars rating, I added the half steps as well to make the ratings more diverse. Here is the link to my review policy, if you want to have a look at my specific ratings: Review Policy

Here is what other bloggers had to say, when I asked this question: How do you rate books? Do you have a formula or do you just go with gut reaction?