All Authors Blog Blitz 2014

The Electric Series! Writing Process Blog Tour

All Authors Blog Blitz 2014

Blog Blitz: Reviews – a hate/love relationship

By Rachael Rippon

When I first self-published a year ago, I was a shiny eyed young thing with an optimistic heart, rose tinted glasses and a certainty that this was it. This was my moment when I would step into the spotlight, to rounds of applause and everybody, from Amazon to Goodreads, would clamour to read my book.

I was certain I’d make millions.

That I’d be the next Hugh Howey.

That Tim Burton, whilst casually browsing Amazon one day, would stumble across ‘The Bagman’ and decide to make it into a movie (this hasn’t happened yet, but I have hope.)

And now, as I’m hurriedly finishing the second book in the trilogy for release later this month, I’m feeling pretty great about this whole self-publishing thing, even though it’s nothing like what I thought it would be.

Because now I realise something which I should have realised from the beginning. Self-publishing isn’t about making millions (ha!), it isn’t even about being famous or selling hundreds of thousands of copies (although that would be nice).

Self-publishing – for me anyway – is about people reading my book and saying, ‘I liked it.’ I’ve had an overwhelming majority of positive reviews from readers and whenever a new one comes up I get a little fizz of joy.

This review-checking addiction, of course, has its own problems as now I’m in a panic that everyone who loved the first book will hate the second. I kind of wish reviews weren’t allowed actually, because then I wouldn’t know what people thought – good or bad. Both kinds of reviews stress me out in different ways.

And so, for better or worse, reviews are an important part of my life. They validate my book, they validate my writing. They show me that maybe yes, Tim Burton will one day make my book into a movie. They also bring out the anal perfectionist in me who thinks nothing I write will ever be good enough.

What I wonder, however, is whether reviews are this important to everyone?

As well as being a self-published author, I also review self-published books. I’ve read many great books, many average books and a few mediocre ones as well. I’ve read books with rave reviews, and yet terrible writing. I’ve read the same story by different authors – nice guy goes on a quest, meets a girl, hardships ensue, saves girl, the end (sound familiar?). Sometimes this story takes place in outer space, sometimes in the past, sometimes in fantasy land and I’m heartily sick of it in all locations. I’ve read books that I wish I could have written, books that I wish I could re-write, books that I wish I could go through with a red pen and circle every single cliché and poorly written sentence. But I can’t, because I only read e-books.

I’ve doled out two star reviews, bestowed five star ones. I’ve judged other people’s creative works critically, analytically, by what works for me and what doesn’t. And I used to think that all other reviews accurately showed the readers opinions and that these opinions were fair and considered.

And yet, just like me, so many authors want positive reviews, they want acclaim and validation. But positive reviews are sometimes hard to come by. And they are rather easy to fake.

Sockpuppet accounts, for instance, are fake accounts created under a fake name, often in order to give an author positive reviews, and, in some cases, poor reviews. Sockpuppet accounts usually have no user photograph, the user will often have only rated that one book and, if there is a review, will often be overly gushy with little analysis, eg. ‘I LOVED THIS BOOK!!! YOU SHOULD TOTALLY READ IT!!!’.

Indeed, I know of at least two reviews on both my Goodreads and Amazon pages that are sockpuppets created by well-meaning family and friends. (Fun little exercise if you have have nothing to do: have a look and see if you can find them.) I’ve since had to ask people I know not to write positive reviews under fake names – mostly because I want reviews to be genuine, but also because when Tim Burton finally makes my book into a movie, I don’t want it revealed that all my positive reviews were sockpuppets. When I’m rich and famous, I want to have some class.

And so, reviews, as important and as wonderful as they are, can be faked for a variety of reasons by both authors and readers. Sometimes it might even be justifiable, often not.

So how important are reviews to readers and authors alike? To what extremes will authors go to get good reviews? To what extent can we trust reviews? To what extent do reviews really portray the readability of a book? Can reviews be considered ‘quality controllers’ of digital self-publishing?

These are some of the questions I’m looking at in my research.

In order to find out the answer to these questions (and many more besides) I have created two surveys.

An author survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/selfpublishedauthorsurvey

And a reviewer survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/selfpublishedreviewersurvey

The survey’s take about half an hour each. If you are either an author or a reviewer (or both!) I would greatly appreciate a response!

About the Author:

Rachael Rippon is researching digital self-publishing for her PhD. She has been writing since she was eleven and reading even longer. Her first self-published book ‘The Bagman’ has received rave reviews from family, friends and readers too. Her second book in the trilogy is due to be released in June this year. She has won several short story competitions and had a few short stories published. She lives in a caravan in Australia, loves reading crime stories, loves writing fantasy stories and is terrified of zombies.