Goodreads Authors/Readers discussion

Why, in all that is holy, am I on this site?
Since joining, I have been spammed to death, have had death threats, and nonsensical attack comments on every post from members without profile pictures.
It seems there is an active group of anti-Goodreads profiles making it impossible to share anything on this site.
Is this the best site for your book's marketing? What site do you like to use?

Robert wrote:  "Why, in all that is holy, am I on this site?"

Why Goodreads?

That was explained in the orientation.
However, both times I posted it, the censors took it down.

Still, if you're curious, you can find it on my GR-author page
posted in response to the question:

        What's this site really for?

Although clearly for you it's too late.
Maybe too late for all of us.
And always was.

I faced the exact same thing here too, Robert.

They completely target self-published authors, as we are the most vulnerable category. At the end of the day, it's just a business for them, and we are the ones who fall into the trap.

Honestly, your only options are to stay or leave - there really is no other choice...

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... nonsensical attack ..."


Robert!

I've flagged these 5 for bombing your ratings:

    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...

Hidden by ellipses:

    202225892-stacy-dutra
    202224770-abdul-salam-aswad
    202224698-alma-martinez
    202224658-james-silvestri
    202224588-kerry-m

It's most likely a single fraudster.

I'll check back from time to time
in case others are created/added.

Wow. I haven't experienced that yet. I hope not to.
I've been on Goodreads for years and though I've never really participated in groups, I can say my overall experience has been good. I haven't gained a whole lot of recognition here but that's pretty much all platforms. It just takes time. I hope.

Yeah. Not a good experience so far on here.

Dennis wrote: "Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... nonsensical attack ..."


Robert!

I've flagged these 5 for bombing your ratings:

    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodrea..."
Thanks for flagging these. I was at work and didn't see them tank the rating til now.
Guess there isn't anything to do but block those members. Although I suspect more profiles will keep popping up.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "Guess there isn't anything to do but block those members.  Although I suspect more profiles will keep popping up."

They're all set to private, created solely for this purpose.
No more have appeared yet.  These 5 might be reused
to attack others as well.

The intent may be to smear your image on Amazon,
where GR ratings are known to appear, no matter how dubious.

I'll try flagging them again with different phrasing,
because I do so love that Kafka feeling on a Monday morning.

Dennis wrote: "Robert Firlotte wrote:  "Guess there isn't anything to do but block those members.  Although I suspect more profiles will keep popping up."

They're all set to private, created solely for this purp..."
I have sent a complaint to Goodreads for these profiles.
I have also tracked an email IP adrress from a death threat letter to a location in Virginia. Although I am Canadian, I will be sending the FBI a note about the individuals exact location and copies of the death threats I have received.
I hope they keep their attention on me so others won't experience this style of harassment.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "I have also tracked an email IP adrress from a death threat letter to a location in Virginia."

That's likely to be northern Virginia, across the river from DC.
There's a sizable international community in the DC area,
many of them with lots of spare time, and quite bored.

The feds can be quite touchy about NCR (national capitol region),
so you may have better luck than if it had come from NY.

I am having a hard time figuring out what their overall goal is. I'm Canadian living in a very rural part of Ontario. Someone makes a threat, we give them an address to meet up at and have a "corrective discussion" with the individual. We're similar to Texas where we stand our ground and don't take prisoners. Not that I'm a violent person or culture, but we don't go quietly into that dark night.
So, here I stay to take the heat away from others.
Thanks for your attention on this.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... we stand our ground and don't take prisoners ..."

I can relate.

As they used to say back in the old country:

    An ounce of cussedness
    is worth a pound of pride.

Love that quote.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "Love that quote."

Ah.

Well, in truth, they never actually said it.
They just lived it.

Robert wrote: "Love that quote."

You just took 3 more hits.
'T's how ya know it's Monday.

For the record, these be the new 3:

    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...
    https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/2...

So new, and already so stale.

That's okay with me. They keep focused on me and let the other authors alone.
I'm starting to have fun and antagonzing them. I'm like a honey badger. I don't give a F@ck! LoL
Bwahahahaha!

Once more into the breach!

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "Once more into the breach!"

    E m b r a c e   c h a o s .

Robert wrote:  "Thanks for flagging these."

Those original 5 are all dead now.
The 3 add-ons are still there.
So I flagged them again.

Cussedness . . .

Goodreads has removed the flagged profiles. They have not removed their ratings that has driven my stars down.
Kinda fucked up thinking to not remove the negative rating as they remove the profiles.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "Goodreads has removed the flagged profiles."

They only removed the first 5.
The 3 that appeared later did not get the same treatment.

GR support works on a transactional basis, one ticket at a time.
The response depends on which hidden thumb turns up or down
– ie, who has that desk on that day, with no attempt at consistency.
The left hand knows not what the right hand is doing.

We're in Vegas.  Just keep trying, eventually you can win.
I'll go flag them again.  It gets easier with each repetition.

Robert wrote:  "Goodreads has removed the flagged profiles."

Flagged them 3 times each in quick succession, this time as spam.
After GR's narrow little interface opens up again, I'll repeat,
this time as harassment.

If anyone else wants to join the fun, this is the text I'm using today:


GR author Robert Firlotte released The Winter Man in early 2025.
It received 2 reviews and 4 ratings averaging 4.5.

https://www.goodreads.com/ book/show/227813692-the-winter-man

Then on June 28, 5 new rogue accounts single-starred this book.
On June 29, 3 more new rogue accounts single-starred this book
while GR was in the process of taking down the first 5.

P L E A S E   F I N I S H   T H E   J O B   ! !

This is one of the remaining 3 rogue accounts created solely for the purpose
of harassing a GR author by gratuitously attacking his book's ratings average.
This is a fraudulent user account serving no purpose but harassment.

In consistency with your previous response,
please remove this rogue account
and the other 2 as well.

https://www.goodreads.com/ user/show/202255135-brian-munoz
https://www.goodreads.com/ user/show/202255075-phillip-maldonado
https://www.goodreads.com/ user/show/202255019-dorothy-r


Note that I've inserted a space into each URL
to prevent copying from inadvertently losing info
due to ellipsis.  I remove those spaces before posting.

Since those accounts are private, click to flag the photo,
and the flag-user screen pops up instead.

It's people like you that make this site worth being on. As a collective, we must continue to be vigilant and strike back at these accounts who's sole purpose is to tear down author's credibility and work.
This may not be much of a thanks, but send me your email and I'll pass along a digital authors copy of my book. It's not great literature, but a fun read with a few errors still in it. First time publishing and all.
Thanks for your determination and hard work on this.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... be vigilant and strike back at these accounts who's sole purpose is to tear down author's credibility and work ..."

Thanks!  Actually I'm nowhere near as good as Liz.

My email is nonstd@gmail.com – an abbreviation of non·standard.
I never read while writing, but I promise to read it as soon as can –
most likely in December.  By then I'll need it desperately.

I've opened a second front in this conflict.
I'm identifying those who feed these tiny monsters,
by writing my own reviews of books that they've supported,
reviews that reveal the marks of the scam.

To make that possible, I started by writing a small tcl script
that gives a quick listing of the anomalies in raters and timings.
The ones who've not been at it for long are most obvious,
so those are the ones I've reviewed so far.

I need to get a better look at the more professional long-standing scams.
The marks are already clear to me but camouflaged, so I need to find
the patterns across multiple titles, to make it clear how they operate.

For Liz!
And for cussedness.

Robert Firlotte wrote: "... make this site worth being on ..."

That worked, the last 3 are now gone too.

Your ratings average is back up to 4.5.

That double-triple insistence paid off.

I had contacted Goodreads over and over. They have deleted the accounts and say they have been investigating the incident.

Dennis wrote: "Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... be vigilant and strike back at these accounts who's sole purpose is to tear down author's credibility and work ..."

Thanks!  Actually I'm nowhere near as good as Liz.
..."
You are much better at this interwebs thing than me. Although if I do ge into trouble, I do have a highschool friend that works at Adobe and another at Microsoft that can usually get me out of any issue along with their crack teams of coders that could go nuclear on these persons if needed. They're actually tracking the death threats I have received. VPN is hard to track but not impossible they say. Just takes a little time.

Robert Firlotte wrote:  "... You are much better at this interwebs thing than me ..."

To be clear, I know nothing of the web.

If the feds hadn't destroyed MaBell, Bell Labs would have created it.
Instead, the job went through DARPA, and this is what we get.
I despise the web.

But I do know numbers.

Old saying, this time for real:

        If you torture numbers long enough,
        they will confess to anything.

When Pavlov experimented on stray dogs, he first devocalized them,
clipped their vocal cords to spare himself the sound of their howls.

        The vast majority of the Goodreads rating averages
        are constantly howling in utmost Pavlovian agony.

Cheers!

Robert wrote: "We're in Vegas. Just keep trying, eventually you can win."

Nailed, lol.

I got my first death threat last week, which I reported to the police.

Melanie Kinder wrote:  "I got my first death threat last week, which I reported to the police."

Well done.  They'll go away as soon as we stop feeding them.

The ones issuing death threats and ratings bombs
are the same ones we pay for fake reviews and ratings boosts.

Storygraph is better and it syncs with Kobo now, which is fantastic for those of us not interested in supporting Amazon and Bezos.

Mellie wrote:  "Storygraph is better ..."

When last I checked, it seemed better for readers.
I saw nothing there for writers.
Was I wrong?

Yeah, I thought Goodreads would be a "Good" place to post my book. But all I have gotten is aggravation. Spam after spam. Most seemed so legitimate and I caught on too late. So far no hate posts or emails. Guess I'm lucky there.

Listen, I really think I have a unique story, but I just don't know how to get it out there. Any recommendations?

Melanie wrote: "I got my first death threat last week, which I reported to the police."

It's disturbing upon first read. Then seeing the kind of threat with spelling mistakes and AI style writing, it seems more ridiculous. But still needs to be taken for what it is. An illegal threat on another.
I just have to think you're doing something right if you're being singled out for harassment.

Dennis wrote: "Mellie wrote:  "Storygraph is better ..."

When last I checked, it seemed better for readers.
I saw nothing there for writers.
Was I wrong?"

So where does Storygraph pull their list of books from? I searched their library and it doesn't seem to have my book on their list.

Janice Pierce wrote:  Listen, I really think I have a unique story,
but I just don't know how to get it out there. Any recommendations?

All I can offer you is a metaphor.

The writers of GR are a vast and motley crowd of pilgrims
who refuse to admit that their holy destination has perished,
swept away decades ago by the relentless digital tide
that some of their prophets did indeed see coming
but none saw it for what it was – not the ultimate press,
but the ultimate erasure.

Dennis wrote: "Mellie wrote:  "I saw nothing there for writers."

I'm not sure what you think a reader site should provide for a writer?

From an author's perspective, just like GR you can have an author profile and access to giveaways - which IMO are far better than what GR offers and they are international and authors can offer multiple formats.

Janice wrote: "Listen, I really think I have a unique story, but I just don't know how to get it out there."

Don't hide behind AI, for starters. An AI profile pik, AI cover, the immediate assumption from readers will be AI written book...so no, it's not "unique" its taken from all the books the models have ingested.

Most readers groups won't allow you to post or allow readers to mention your book because of the obvious use of AI. You also can't advertise it for the same reason, as many advertisers have a no AI policy.

Mellie wrote:  I'm not sure what you think a reader site should provide for a writer?

Nor am I.  In the abstract, I'd say visibility and availability.

To be visible without having to trick an algorithm.
To be available to interact with whoever might be interested,
which also depends on visibility.

The mechanisms would hopefully be something a bit more telling
than a number from 1 to 5 and a poorly defined category.
They already have page count, or even word count.

While doing the scan they could also come up with averages
and deviations for sentence length, word size, vocabulary
extent – just try something easy but different . . . for a start.
No one even tries.

Mellie wrote: "Janice wrote: "Listen, I really think I have a unique story, but I just don't know how to get it out there."

Don't hide behind AI, for starters. An AI profile pik, AI cover, the immediate assumpti..."

I can second that, I put my book into AI for it to cone up with what my characters would look like to get a better feel for the characters and because I've then used that as a trailer for my book on places like TT and IG people have Instantly thought AI even though it's taken 11 months to perfect my vision, 5 drafts and writing til 2am in the morning most nights whilst working a 50 hour a week job too.

Robert wrote: "Melanie wrote: "I got my first death threat last week, which I reported to the police."

It's disturbing upon first read. Then seeing the kind of threat with spelling mistakes and AI style writing,..."

Thank you for putting into that perspective. It really does help. The message was in all CAPS and that made me think it was a bunch of kids messing around. But who really can say? I filed the police report for my family's safety. I feel better with each passing mundane day. Mundane is good. It is safe. LOL!

Dennis wrote: "Melanie Kinder wrote:  "I got my first death threat last week, which I reported to the police."

Well done.  They'll go away as soon as we stop feeding them.

The ones issuing death threats and rat..."

Who would pay for fake reviews at their own expense to destroying an author? That seems like an awful way to waste money. I wouldn't even pay for a good review for myself. Maybe they have more disposable income than I do. They'd have to. And what exactly do they get out of it? I just don't get it, I guess.

Dennis wrote: "In the abstract, I'd say visibility..."

I don't think any site is going to give writers visibility for free. Times have changed and its not 2012 anymore. It's been years since authors could rely on organic visibility. You need to either invest time in growing and building a newsletter list, street team, readerbase, or you need to invest money in advertising - AMS ads, FB or something else.

Mellie wrote, Times have changed and its not 2012 anymore.

No problem, I'll stay invisible – their loss.

Crystal is not Crystal.
The post came originally form Elowen Grace,
an obvious fraud, who had stolen
one of Crystal's old photos.

Once confronted, the name changed
from Elowen Grace to Crystal Seitz,
compounding the fraud.

But the location remained Las Vegas.
Crystal lives in Boston.

This user just joined and immediately started looking for victims.
Has definitely been here before.

Crystal Seitz wrote Inheritance of Scars.

Dennis wrote: "No problem, I'll stay invisible – their loss."

There are 10,000,000 books on Amazon (and growing every day!) Why do you think yours are deserving of free special attention without you putting any effort in?

As readers, we are swamped with great books to read. Personally, I rely on word of mouth recommendations from friends to find my next book, or I stick with the authors I know/love. If I'm trying a new author, its either due to the BookBub email or a social media post that sparked my attention.

If you want to stay invisible then that's entirely your choice. But don't then complain that no one is buying your books or leaving reviews. Readers can't pick up a book we have never hear about.

Mellie wrote:  But don't then complain ...

    observation   ≠   complaint

Have a nice day.

Thanks for the input and being honest. I made mistakes in the beginning. The book is not AI written, whether you believe it or not. Yes, I used CHATGBT to create the cover. I'm not an artist and did not have the money to hire one. I thought the second cover came out great and embodied some of the characters. If you don't like it, that's fine, sue me.

As for my profile picture. Well, I don't think I can tell you anything that will change your mind, but here it goes. I was initially embarrassed about some of the content in my book and came up with the name and used AI to create a picture of my alter-ego. So what?

I don't think AI should be used to write a book, all right? Everything in my book came from my head as I sat down and started writing. AI should only be used as a tool, just like spell check on Microsoft Word. Seems to me there are a lot of people out there that look to find reasons to criticize someone without knowing the facts or even asking. They assume the wrong thing.

I go to book stores and frankly, every cover in that store could be AI created! So what if my cover is AI generated?

Mellie, what you said is based off false assumptions or maybe bad experiences you have had. I don't know.