In all fairness, I don’t think Mike’s asking for all reviews to be genteel, hoity-toity NYTBR stuff. What he’s describing isn’t a question of whether the reviewer liked a book or not, who the reviewer is, etc. His guidelines are about making reviews useful to other readers.

I have no problem with Jennie Random posting on her Myspace page “omg this book was awesome!!!!” That serves to tell people that she liked it, and maybe her friends who know her tastes will also pick up the book. What Mike seems to be after is a set of principles that will help make a review useful to a broader audience. In that regard, I agree with him. “I didn’t like Old Man’s War because John Scalzi’s a jerk who taped bacon to his cat” is a less useful comment than one that follows guideline four, at least for the purposes of figuring out what you, the prospective reader, might think of OMW. (Equally unhelpful is “Old Man’s War is great, because the author’s this guy who taped bacon to his cat.”)

I say, power to the Internet; I’m all in favor of reviewing not being entirely in the hands of a limited set of gatekeepers. But some reviews are better uses of a reader’s time than others.

But no, I am not suggesting that only folks with thick skins should write. I am suggesting that thin-skinned writers should expect to be upset a lot.

Anyhoo, as you write, it’s a whole different world out there these days. Reviewing (imagine that in quotes if you want) is no longer the province of english professors and wine-sippin’ books editors in the newspaper. It’s Joe six-pack. It’s Geeky McGeekerson. It’s the Mom reading between soccer games. All over the web. And at all levels of quality. All of them still have some measure of usefulness. It’s a slice of “word of mouth” that I get, and it’s much wider than only getting it from my friends in person.

I, for one, am quite glad reviewing has been democratized and unprofessionalized. Sure, it’s gotta suck some for the authors cause everything isn’t genteel anymore. But I prefer the visceral reaction to the hoity-toity NYTBR wanna be stuff that I was stuck with in the early 1990s.

“I didn’t like story X because it had big space battles.” is a useful review because I can look at it and see “the story has big space battles, I hate those too, I won’t buy it”, or sometimes “the story has big space battles, I love those, maybe I’ll buy it even though the review was negative”.

If the reviewer simply says “I didn’t like story X”, then, well, uh, why do I care what they thought? Plenty of people out there don’t like the books I read, plenty do, I know that already.

I don’t tend to believe that reviews need to be constructive however, “this could have been written by an 8th grader!” is a perfectly valid opinion that tells you what they objected to - the quality of the writing and the maturity. It certainly isn’t constructive, but constructive feedback is what your editorial team and first readers are for, not reviewers, their job is to let the potential readers know what they liked or disliked about the book.

Of course “this could have been written by an 8th grader”, might not actually be an objection to the quality of the writing but just an insult, without context it’s hard to tell.

I’ll still fight it when, where I can.

And this is an issue I’ve had for a long time. Back in the 1990s, I used to review for Tangent. I recall having a long go-round with the editor (Dave Treusdale, whom I respect even when I disagree with him) about a review of story he ran that was grossly unprofessional in my opinion (”This could have been written by an 8th grader!” or very similar words). There’s a professional and constructive way to express that opinion, and then there’s what the reviewer wrote.

Well, these are just my opinions but I’m going to make a case for them and maybe things will improve, a little, in some parts of the world.

I’ve recently begun reviewing for publication again - after a 25+ year long hiatus.

Not having read any of your books, I haven’t reviewed any of them (I think that’s a guideline you forgot to mention, lol).

I’ll be happy to forward links to reviews that are up on the web so you can judge my adherence to your rules for yourself. I’m an old-school reviewer. Beginning, middle, end, context, no spoilers and a reasoned opinion based on the material at hand.

I’d like to see that kind of thing from everyone doing a review, just as you would. However, I think you missed a paradigm shift somewhere. The word ‘review’ no longer means review. These days on the internet, ‘review’ actually means ‘opinion’.

Like anatomical features that everyone has. Some more than others.

Your previous commentor hit the nail on the head, at least from within the sensibilities of the new paradigm. You’re “just” a content provider. The content users and opinionaters are the folks that really matter - or so they wish to believe.

I think if you break the reviews down into real reviews versus opinion reviews, you’ll be better able to weather the storm. Don’t trade blows with those guys, they’re ‘opinion’ is just as valid as yours, but you’ve got the moral high ground. All they can do is type. You write.

I think you’d

You’re a moron! An 8th grader is more astute than you!

How do you like that “review” of what you wrote? Do you think anyone will actually benefit from reading it? How about if I actually addressed the content of your comment, in a way that would let people know why I have a negative opinion?

I’m not complaining about people not liking my book. I’m complaining, in what I hope is a constructive way, about “reviewing” that isn’t, and doesn’t actually help a reader make a decision about whether or not to read a book.

As a writer, I’m going to complain less about a gushing but content-free review. They’re not helpful either, but they don’t spread animosity.

If you’re seeing complaints about this becoming more common, perhaps it’s because the internet gives everyone a voice and a potentially large audience, and there are a lot of people who don’t know how to carry themselves professionally. Writers have thick skins, but we’re human, too. So, your last point doesn’t make sense. Only people who LIKE getting trashed publicly should write books?

If you don’t want people who don’t like your book reviewing it (for whatever reason, including that they don’t like the genre) don’t publish it. Reviewers are readers who have a keyboard.