Romance reviews / the online romance readers community

At Romancing the Blog, Kassia of Booksquare discusses a topic close to my heart: romance reviews. In her entry, I’d Hoped To Be The Insightful One, But That Didn’t Work Out, she says:

One thing we do in this genre is sell ourselves short when it comes to critical reviews. One reason, of course, is that some reviewers are friendly with authors. You don’t want to hurt feelings. I understand that, but I think it’s a disservice to everyone.

Absolutef***kingly! Well, I'm sure this is not what Kassia intends, but IMO, it's a huge disservice to readers. When I first came online in the romance reader community ... we are talking about seven years ago? ... I was quite shocked at this mentality that it was not right to criticise romance books in public. There was a huge number of romance authors and readers that loved to parrot this line: My mother/grandma/auntie/God always told me that if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all. I agree with that somewhat, but the point is books are not people! If you stabbed a knife right into a book, it doesn't bleed. It's an inanimate object. Oh, no, what they really meant was if you criticised a book, you're criticising its author. This didn't make sense to me. Especially when some of these posters had no qualms in tearing some films and TV dramas apart, and some non-romance novels. Why these double standards? This led me right into flame wars and squabbles. I didn't go out looking for trouble, trust me, but I had to challenge the mentality because it wasn't right. Especially when I saw how some readers actually attacked other readers for daring to air 'negative' opinions. The worst ones are those that were egged on by some romance *authors*. Because of these authors, there were some packs prowling acrossing readers' message boards, ready to slap a poster into apologising and promising not to do it again. It was awful. In those days, it was hard to find a place where readers could air their honest opinions without fearing online attacks. At times it was demoralising. But nowadays, it's much better, mostly because of All About Romance. I'm seeing more freedom in airing opinions, good and bad. But as a Scot, I have a long memory, so I don't buy books from those authors who publicly and actively encouraged that kind of behaviour from their readers. Anyhow, it seems that there is still some traces of that old mentality, but there is enough savvy posters who would put a stop to a potential mob attack. Authors' bad online behaviour don't bother me. Neither do their bad moods on certain days. But I do take it personally if some decide to slap a reader's hand for 'not being supportive'. Word of mouth is pretty effective, so I don't understand why some authors think it's a good idea to lend their public support to a miffed author against readers. Readers! I don't get this at all. At end of the day, readers are customers. So, slapping a reader's hand or bitching about a review on readers' message board is just as bad as telling your boss that his wife is an ugly dog. I know it doesn't make sense, but my loyalty is to fellow readers, first and last. If they make time to recommend books, offer good constructive criticism of certain romances, and discuss topics close to our hearts, then I'll return the favour. That's the way it works, and so far many of us are happy with this system. Don't get me wrong - there is plenty of posters who do dislike negative comments, reviews and, of course, Mrs Giggles. Yet they are likely to be the ones who run to certain authors to let them know that their books are being dissed. Hence those magic appearances from authors, thanking some posters for kind comments and shaking their fingers at 'naughty' posters. Bad move. I do know for a fact that many, many readers appreciate honest book discussions because, mostly, they come to rely on fellow readers as there aren't many romance review sites that they could 'trust'. I know that they trust authors' recommendations least because, according to their posts, a) authors know the process of writing a book so they have different perspective, b) there is a good chance that these authors are friends of authors whose books they recommend, and c) there is a 'hidden' agenda [I don't know what, though!]. They consistently say that they trust fellow readers' recommendations most. As for online romance reviews? It's pot luck. According to a few discussions we had over years, many felt that far too many reviewers are too 'generous' towards authors, sometimes to the point where some readers feel that these reviews aren't written for them. The very people that reviewers and authors are supposed to target. The very people who have the money to burn. One said that she felt 'dirty' because sometimes it seemed she was looking on an intense lovefest between a reviewer and an author. Another said that she hated it when she read reviews that do nothing but praise books, yet still don't explain what makes these books so fantastic. She admitted that at end of every review, she felt confused and frustrated, so she didn't buy any books recommended by that romance review site. If I remember correctly, some guessed that some reviewers are friends of those authors or/and are aspiring authors themselves. This, they feel, gets in the way of offering honest reviews. Some expressed their confusion and frustation towards Romantic Times and many admitted that they rarely take RT's star ratings seriously. [I don't take notice of star ratings, mostly because it doesn't mean anything to me.] So, for many, there isn't many romance review sites that fit their needs. They don't want 'slash and dice' reviews, they don't want 'author-friendly' reviews, and they generally don't like sites that offer long-winded reviews. They generally don't care about motivations, characterisations and such. They just want to know if it's a good romance, who are the h/h, what the story is about, the level of sensuality, is there anything that may put them off, and does the reviewer like it? If so, why? If not, why? We don't really have this type online [The Romance Reader is the nearest thing but it doesn't review that many books, so readers lose out]. So, at the end of the day, all we have is ourselves, hence the popularity of readers' message boards and, for me, readers' blogs [my current favourites: Rosario [probably the best there is online] and Alyssa]. In a good book discussion, posters follow the usual route: What work and what doesn't, and why. If there is one that disliked a book, we love it when another countered that by listing reasons why she loved it. Or vice versa. It gives an opportunity to decide whether to buy a book or not. More than not, we do buy a copy because, I think, we want to read it to judge for ourselves. It's a lot better than those time-wasting flame wars that either attack or defend an author in disguise of a book. Actually, not long ago, on one authors' message board, there was a slagfest against Mrs Giggles, two fellow readers said elsewhere that they will never read a certain romance author's books again because of her catty comments about Mrs Giggles whom these two fellow readers consider "one of us". Like I said, word of mouth amongst readers online is effective. Be good, be bad & be safe.