Give the Readers Some Credit & Stop Working the System

What good is a great book if nobody reads it?  Authors are more aware of this question than anyone.  It's why authors and publicists give out ARCs.  It's why many authors delve into social media. And why as bloggers, our inboxes are filled with more review requests than we could ever possibly read. 

I've seen authors say on Twitter that one of the best ways you can show your support for a book, is to write a review.  Some specifically ask for reviews on Amazon.  I've even had publicists ask me to post there.  And that's no chore for me.  I post all of my reviews on Amazon anyway. I know there are a lot of people who aren't part of the blogosphere or social media or Goodreads. For those people, Amazon reviews are the only ones they read.  Which brings me to my point.

I noticed early on in reviewing, the way people work the system on Amazon. Basically, there are three featured reviews on every book/ product.  Each review offers the question, "Was this review helpful to you?"  And other customers can vote yes or no.  The three featured reviews are the ones with the best helpful-to-unhelpful ratio.  This sounds good in theory, but what if there are 100 reviews?  No one will read them all.  And with just a few well placed unhelpful clicks, anyone (or a small group of people) can push a review onto or off of the main product page.

For a long time, I believed it was only fellow reviewers behind the manipulations. That is, people who wanted their own reviews featured would bump off a more popular one by voting it down and getting their review bumped up.  But now, we know there are some authors in on it too.  Some are having friends bump down negative reviews --or even hiring people to do so.  And they are putting up fake, glowing reviews too.  There are people out there who sell their services to write positive reviews.  Not to mention the dummy accounts set up by family, friends, or even the authors themselves... devised solely as a vehicle to add positive reviews.  It's depressing.

I understand the impulse.  Who is going to buy a book with no reviews?  Or who is going to buy one where the reviews are negative?  These are the obvious questions.  But authors, you are hurting yourselves and other authors much more than you are helping.  It's easy to spot the fake reviews.  They are often about four lines long. They say your book is great with very little explanation as to why.  If anyone is savvy enough to click on the reviewer's name, they'll see that this is one of maybe two posts the reviewer has ever written, assuming it's not the only one they've ever written.   It's insulting.  Not to mention, "It's great. One of the best books I have ever read," isn't a review that will make anyone buy a book. It's meaningless. 

As for the practice of bumping down less flattering reviews, let me tell you a true story.  I read "story X" by a debut author and liked it. It was a four star read.  I reviewed it on the blog, Goodreads, and Amazon. I put it on Facebook. I tweeted about it.  Then my review was bumped down, so that only five star reviews now sit on her product page on Amazon.  And they are those four line fake-reviews.  Anyone with a discerning eye will see those lame ass things and just click away.  Hear me when I say this, I would be 100x more likely to buy a book with a thoughtful, detailed 4-star review, than a meaningless fake 5 star review.  You need to give readers more credit.  We are not stupid.  Even a negative review isn't the kiss of death some people think it is.  I wrote a review a couple of weeks ago for a book that wasn't great for me.  I explained why it wasn't a good fit and rated it accordingly.  Then someone used the Amazon link and bought it straight from my blog.  The things I didn't like in the book, were clearly a selling point to someone else.  Believe in your work. Let the chips fall where they may.

You aren't just hurting yourself, you know.  You're also hurting other authors.  I got a review request a couple of weeks ago to read Fire Baptized by Kenya Wright.  As I do with all review requests, I checked it out on Amazon and Goodreads and found **surprise** a bunch of 4.5 and 5 star reviews.  I almost didn't read it.  Do you hear what I'm saying? I almost didn't read the book because it had too many positive reviews.  But then I looked closer and I saw that the reviews were more detailed than the faker ones I usually see. I liked the blurb, so I said, "what the hell..." and I read it.  And it was awesome. It earned its 5 star reviews AND I ALMOST DIDN'T READ IT.  And that pisses me off.  It also pisses me off that someone else might not read it for the same reason.  Or the same thing could happen with another gem of an indie book, because some other author out there fucked with the system.

I can only imagine how hard it is for new authors. I'm sure you think you're doing what you need to do.  But please think about what I'm saying.  You're aren't fooling us.