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On Negative Reviews

I knew, in an abstract sense, that authors have fragile egos. It's inevitable, when you pour your heart into creating something, that you want people to respond positively. As Stephen King put it, "Authors are needy." But I honestly wouldn't have believed the kind of crap that some authors spew at critical reviews, and at [...]
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Published on January 29, 2012 15:43
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message 1: by Nile Princess (new)
Jan 29, 2012 07:11PM

Nile Princess Wonder how many authors will agree with you on this Arshad. A very honorable view, in my opinion. I try my best to always give balanced reviews as there's usually something about a book that I like, even if I dislike the book as a whole, but I find that though I pride myself on tactfulness in real life, I can't seem to find the words to say that I didn't like a book without it coming across that well...I didn't like it. I always think about what I was told years ago - when offering compliments/constructive criticism everything before the BUT is negated by what comes after it. To that end, I try to mix praise with criticism throughout a 'negative' review, but some authors push out such shoddy work or sometimes a book is so bad that I can't help but be brutally honest.

I do think that authors need constructive criticism to grow. As hard as it may be to take sometimes (and really, who likes to be criticized?) it takes more than the 'this is awesome's of an author's core fanbase to ensure that they keep producing quality work.


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