As book
bloggers writing reviews is our daily „bread“. I wrote a blog last year explaining
my rating system. Now, us book bloggers, we talk a lot and we exchange our
thoughts on books, but also other blogging issues. I think it happened to all
of us that we didn’t like a book and when it comes to writing the review it
gets really hard. „How will I write it in a way that the author or publisher
doesn’t get upset?“
Well, let
me tell you one thing, reviews are not there to please an author! It might
sound cruel and we all want to be friends with the authors we like. Yes,
Twitter is great and I have met a lot of great authors through it. It’s
wonderful to chat with them and I enjoy the contact very much, but I think when
it comes to reviewing it’s important to be constructive and honest.
I had
cases, where I didn’t like a book and I felt really bad about it. I’ve learned
to make the best out of the situation. I write the review, put my honest
opinion in it and try to explain the way I felt about a book. There are some
book bloggers out there who only post reviews of books they like and everything
under a 3* is not going on the blog. For me that’s not what blogging and
reviewing is about. There are so many books out there, different genres,
authors and stories, so not every book is for everyone. We have different
tastes and it’s natural that we don’t like every book. Reviewing is about
sharing your opinion on a book, whether it’s good or bad. It is a feedback for
the author, but also information for other readers, who are looking for a new
book to read. Of course I always feel a
little bad writing a bad review, it’s also harder to find the right words in my
opinion. It gets even more difficult when you are supposed to review the book for
a blog tour, I always feel kind of bad and I think that will stick, but I’ve
learned to write my reviews in an honest, constructive and open way, I include
examples and I mention the good as well as the bad things. I’ve had blog tours
or publishers who said that they only want 3* reviews or higher ones, I also
had authors who mentioned that in emails. Of course all authors want good
feedback and for promotions only the high ones count. You can’t please everyone
with your stories and you don’t have to!!! Yes, seeing a one star or 2 star
review is not nice and some of these reviews are not constructive, but I think
authors still have to accept them.
My tip for
all the book bloggers: Be true to yourself, be honest and say what you feel, as
long as you explain it in your review it’s all good. There will always be
authors who don’t like that, but it’s their problem!!!
