Book Chat: Authors Being Negative Towards Reviewers

~ Elaine Howlin

Good morning/afternoon people,

I want to share a very interesting article with you all today about something a lot of reviewers will probably have experienced or witnessed before. That is authors (and sometimes other reviewers) attacking people for the reviews they write. I haven’t experienced this myself but I have witnessed it happen to a friend of mine who stopped reviewing altogether because of what was said to her.

This behaviour is completely unprofessional from the author and a deplorable way to interact with your audience.

Check out Graceling Accountant’s article below.

Graceling Accountant

Hi Ya’ll.

So I wanted to open up a discussion about a problem I am noticing more and more across various social platforms: some authors, generally not highly-publicized authors but no promises, have been attacking reviewers for bad reviews of their book.

Just a warning ahead of time, the screenshots are a little blurry but still readable, and if you’re not a fan of bad language this post might not be for you.

I hopped on Goodreads today ready to scroll through my feed and noticed a huge conversation surrounding a review of The Black Rose byEliana Bonaguro. The posts have since been deleted that the author made, but after reading a negative review on their book that someone had written the author decided it was a good idea to start attacking that reviewer in the comments on their review. A ghost account also started insulting the reviewer at…

View original post 789 more words

Published by Elaine Howlin

Elaine lives in the lush green countryside of Ireland with her husband. She spends her time lost in the pages of books and journals, reading and creating for hours on end.

33 thoughts on “Book Chat: Authors Being Negative Towards Reviewers”

    1. Yes! No need to worry it’s the majority of reviews that are bad. Then you should probably wonder how you can fix your story.

      Like

      Reply

  2. I am amazed that any author would choose to denigrate themselves to name calling! Wow. The great thing about reading a book is that how a person feels is completely subjective. Their own life experiences reflect on how they feel about what they are reading. You can’t control that environment! Wow.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  4. Authors have just got to suck it up, there’s no upside in responding. On the flip side I do a bit of reviewing but, if it’s that bad (less than 3*) then I just won’t. Why would you unless you’re a professional reviewer? Just leave it and move on to the next one.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  5. I saw this on Kim’s blog where she shared it as well and I think this is just horrible and unprofessional. I didn’t realize this crazy stuff happened on Goodreads until last week someone commented on one of my reviews that I looked like a creepy clown!🤤 Then I saw this post two days later and was like WOW! This stuff happens on a reading website! This author was completely unprofessional and wrong in these posts! Ugh!😯

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  8. This has happened to me! I did a review on a book from a small press – yes, a small independent press, not a single author. They replied to my review on Goodreads to point out what I had gotten wrong in my review. I’ll not be reviewing anything that press puts out again!
    I agree – once I hit ‘publish’ and my work goes out there into the world, I have no control over what other people think. If they like it, cool. If they don’t like it, that’s cool to.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  9. Wow, kind of mind blowing really … If you can’t accept criticism as an author you may as well never show your writing to anyone. If one believes themselves to be better than a bad review, then write a well written response … Insults only prove the poor writing in the first place … Sad really, but not a surprise to me.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

      1. The thing that gets me about this whole thing is that – whatever other people think of your work, for good or ill, it still doesn’t change what your job is, as a writer – to write better than you did last time. To write so amazingly well that other people say “wow” (not that I get there). But in that light, if you get bad criticism – maybe that should help us write better, braver, sharper!

        Liked by 1 person

  10. that’s very unprofessional and … well, a clueless author. negative reviews = bad publicity = sales. i admit, as an author about to get published, i’d be disappointed with a negative review, but i also know enough to know that a review, even the negative ones, means more sales. + not everyone likes the same things. i rememmber, not very long ago, when i was researching the indie industry, i read about this author with more than a million sales – and recall that i was one of the people who picked up her book because i read a review saying that the book had a great plot line, great characters, great story, but there were so many typos and mistakes, that the book lost all the appeal. now, curious me had to pick that one up, just to see if i’d find these same mistakes. and there was the author with over a million sales

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  11. What the hell is wrong with people? I’ve seen this issue with many other bloggers/reviewers, but thankfully I haven’t had this done yet.

    There was this one author who kept contacting me so I could review his work. I did some research on GR and found he hounded several bloggers who gave him low reviews, so I simply declined his request.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  14. Agreed, highy unprofessional attitude on the author’s part. Personally, I think Barthes said it right – ‘Death of the Author’ – the work stops belonging to us as soon as we hit publish.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.