I’m Not Going To Rate My Own Book

I’ve made a decision. I won’t be rating my own book.

As background for those who don’t know, my novel in story form, Bones Buried in the Dirt, will be published by River Otter Press on January 1, 2013. Here is the Goodreads site for it as well. However, no matter how much I want to get the ratings going on Goodreads and amazon and such, I won’t be rating it myself.

Frankly, I’ve heard both ways on this. I’ve known plenty of people who rated their own books and think they have every right to. They read it, right? They must have really liked it or they wouldn’t have written it, right? At the same time, I can see that a lot of people get really mad about this. I can see their point as well. I can see both sides, and that left me the question of what to do.

Really, I usually can only do one thing when I think both sides of an issue have equally valid points: nothing. I won’t rate my own book, but I won’t think anything bad about any author that does. I’ll work to get word about my book out there where people can hear about it…but I won’t rate it. Not on Goodreads, amazon, or anything like that. My book will stand or fall based on what other people think, not me. My ratings will be preserved for the works of other authors.

Now, people on both sides of this issue might still get mad at me. Some people might even think I’m spending a lot of time worrying about an issue they consider relatively insignificant. However, it’s an issue that concerns me and was one I thought about. Whatever people think, this is what I’m going with.