Musings on reviewing and sharing opinions. Do you have it in you to reject something you don’t like and discuss your opinion with the creator?
Someone poured her heart and soul into writing this. Do you have it in you to reject it if you don’t like it? And if you do reject it, do you feel happy about it? Neutral? Or sad, right before you go into virtual hiding and hope that you will never meet the author in real life?
You can simply resort to saying that the piece of writing does not fit your taste. This is a pretty neutral and widely accepted comment as everyone’s taste is different. It also shows weakness. Try to look beyond yourself and express what makes it not right for you. Is your dislike the result of something that is objectively wrong? If so, then point it out and give feedback.
Your honest review
With every word you speak, you see the author’s soul and spirit shrink. Some have a strong shell built around them, a fortress from which they can achieve pyrrhic victories. But even the most hardened writer receives the occasional dent in her armor. The hurt creeps into her eyes and the temperature in the room drops a few degrees. You heartless consumer! Let’s speak again when I evaluate your work. P.S. Thanks for taking the time to review this book. One day you will get better at deciding which books you should read or skip.
Review the reviewer
In the second round, the author gives you some honest feedback about the review you wrote. She says that your review is not objective at all! She is aware of the fact that readers want to hear your personal experience, but why does it blind you for all the facts that you didn’t mention? If you don’t notice the writing style and the poetic flow of the sentences, does that mean that the text spoke to your subconscious mind and reached you on a deeper level without you being aware of it?
You say the story is boring, but it is actually a very truthful account of what happens to these characters. Not every person’s life is exciting. Some people live uneventful lives. And some detectives are simply brilliant and crack the case with ease.
She does appreciate that you took the time to read her book. Bad buzz is still buzz.
The tables are turned
After this encounter you – unsurprisingly – start reading a new book and write another review. The same things happen.
Some years later you have a huge portfolio of book reviews. This collection can be considered a bookwork of its own. Your readers love to provide you with feedback about the work you delivered: the hundreds of reviews that you wrote, sharing your emotions and baring your thoughts for a wide audience.
En masse they want to tell you about the inconsistency of the work that you delivered. Some reviews are short, others are long. At times it reads like you didn’t like the book while you praise it with your words. Was your soul absent for a moment? It is clear that you like philosophizing, that’s great, but we want to hear more about the characters in the book, not about you. P.S. Thanks for making us aware of all the great stories out there.
Reaching out
You decide to reach out to the readers who left you comments and emails. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. And you decide to single out one of the commenters. Yet no matter how hard you try, you can’t establish contact. With every comment added to your review, the level of anonymity increases. You have a face, the author has a face, but that is where the chain ends.
After gathering all opinions, the general consensus is a compromise of many different views. If you cancel out the most negative with the most positive, you end up with a neutral opinion that hardly mentions anything in the story at all.
It is always more impressive if the narrative manages to reach one individual than the anonymous, faceless mass. It should reach you, so you should just read the book and decide for yourself whether you like it or not. A review or signed comment is welcome, but you can also suffice with placing an anonymous comment, anywhere. Just post that it is a ‘good book that should be liked’. P.S. Sometimes I wish I could do just that.
**These musings are not based on any real-life events**
