Tag Archives: amazon reviews

It was bound to happen…

When one releases one’s own works to the general public, it stands to reason that not everyone will love what you do.  This goes for people who draw, paint, sing, play instruments, direct, act, etc. etc. etc.

As an author, my hope, as should be the hope of all artists out there, is that the number of people who like your work will be far greater than those who don’t.

At this point, I have 44 ratings on Goodreads.com for my works.  In total, the reviews for all my works merits a 3.89 rating out of 5, a number that frankly thrills me to no end.

Reading over the reviews, there are the positive ones.  Look, I’ve got an ego and, like everyone out there, I love to have my ego stroked by people who love what I’ve done.

To them: Thank you.  Thank you very, very, very much.

But some of the reviews make me chuckle.

Over at Amazon.uk (the British Amazon service), a reader named “sonnet” offered a four out of five star rating for my novel Haze and wrote that it was A surprisingly good read.

Again, I really appreciate the review but also couldn’t help but think that the reader was genuinely surprised an independent writer could do something “good”.  Was the surprise based on this?

Who knows.  Perhaps I’m reading too much into this.

Over at amazon.jp, the Japanese amazon service, I received a 2 star out of five review from Orezqtotter for my graphic novel The Dark Fringe and his/her review, under the heading of Too Simple, was Everything goes like as I could expect and nothing unpredictable.

Again (part deux), I don’t expect everything I do will appeal to everyone, though I do take issue with the notion that The Dark Fringe’s story is “too simple” or predictable.

But, again, this is this reader opinion and I can respect it didn’t turn him/her on, its his/her absolute right to have an opinion of said product.

Then there are these types of reviews, reviews that, frankly, irk me.

A few days ago on amazon.com my latest novel, Foundry of the Gods, received a one star review.

The review, under the headline “One Star“, is by Tony6232 who wrote: Did not Order this.

Amazon.com allows you to see the reviews of the people who post and, curious to get an idea of Tony6232’s reviewing, I found that on that same date s/he wrote the review for my novel s/he wrote three other one star reviews with the very same Did not Order this comment.  Of the four items s/he reported, mine was the only novel.

I’m assuming Tony6232 is sincere in his/her comments that, perhaps, someone illegally took over his/her amazon account (the Gods know this can happen!) and purchased things s/he didn’t want.

However…

…what the reviewer did was take out that anger/frustration on a product instead of where it should have gone to, however that order was made.  And by offering the one star review, his/her opinion brings the overall reviews of my novel down as well, especially when the book hasn’t received all that many reviews to this point.

I can’t help but think there will be people who look at the overall review numbers and, unless they scrutinize the reviews, will think the book isn’t good because the overall ratings are low even if it is no fault of the product itself.

Understand: I know I’m not the first person with a product placed on amazon that has faced a bad review for something unrelated to the product itself.  It is, however, the first time it has happened to me.

For example, I’ve read many poor reviews for products where, it turned out, the reviewer was upset not about the product but rather that it was delivered damaged to their door.

Think about that.

You order a book or movie or CD or whathaveyou and it is delivered to your house and the box is smashed and, unfortunately, the product within is damaged.

Instead of contacting amazon or the postal carrier and complaining about the delivery, you give the product a one star review even if you note that its because of a damaged product.  Unfortunately, there may be people out there unlike me who do not read the reviews and think the one star review is for the product itself.

So what can one do?  For me, I replied to Tony6232 with the following comment:

From looking at your profile, it is clear there were three other products you “reviewed” with a similar statement, ie that you “did not order this”.

While I appreciate reviews -positive or negative- of my novels, it seems your issue is not with my book but rather with Amazon.com itself. I hope you get the issue resolved.

There’s little else at this point one can do.