Hello and happy Sunday! Here in America, it’s Mother’s Day, so I’d like to wish a happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there reading this. I hope you’ve received something nice today, and get to set aside some time to yourself today to relax and recharge.
Just like some things (wine, for one) are for adults and not kids, my topic for today is about how reviews are for readers. If you’ve been in bookish circles online for longer than a month or two, you are probably familiar with this topic, which usually comes up when an author has shown up in reader spaces, like the comments section of Goodreads, and attacked a reviewer for their opinion.
I’m going to keep things short, but I want to bring up three things that come to mind for me, and then set you guys loose to share your thoughts, because I really want to hear from you on this one.
First of all, I personally like to adhere to my own kind of code of ethics as a reviewer. When reviewing a book, I stick to the subject matter in the book and don’t write about the author’s personal thoughts or actions unless they are directly related to the material in the book, such as a memoir. Although I haven’t read it, and don’t plan to, an example that comes to mind is Kristi Noem talking about shooting a young dog she owned because it performed badly on a hunt, and then doubling down on that when asked about it publicly. Also, if I write a negative review about a book, I don’t tag the author. It’s just rude. Finally, I only review books that I read.
Along with reviewer ethics, I think there should be some ethics coming from authors as well. Author Hannah Murray used to always say on Twitter that “reviews are for readers,” and speak up about it when an author would go into reader spaces and get worked up about the reviews. But it’s important for reviewers to have a space to freely express their opinions, and that’s all that reviews are—opinions. How each person feels about a book is subjective, and the book that one reader loves, another reader is going to hate. And when an author reacts inappropriately to a review that they weren’t tagged in or invited to check out by the reviewer, it really turns readers off more than a bad review.
So how do you feel about reviews being for readers? Do you have a code of ethics that you follow about reviews?
Categories: Sunday Bookish Discussion
Leah's Books 
Definitely agree with only reviewing books that one has read: I see people on goodreads one-starring books simply because they don’t like the author or disagree with their premise. It de-values the platform as a hole and makes me think much less of the ‘reviewer’. Also appreciate only reviewing the book, and not the author — one of my temptations is overly comparing one book to another instead of appraising a book on its own merits.
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Yes to all of this!! I really try to be conscious while reviewing and keep it to only critiques of the contents of the book. Something I’ve started to do recently in my lower starred reviews is to include who the book would be a better fit for – for example, if it featured a trope I didn’t like, or it incorporated elements I didn’t resonate with. And I’ll always try to put in something positive about the book. It’s funny, because there’s only a few times that I haven’t been able to find a single positive thing I could say.
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