Putting a book out into the world

In the old days, that is about fifteen years ago, when you published a book it was hard to know what anyone really thought about it, or even what happened to it once you had signed it off. If you had written a book for a wide audience, you might expect a few reviews in the mags and broadsheets; if it was strictly academic, you might wait two or three years before you saw a review or two in the journals (but by that time you had forgotten what was driving you in the book and were well into the next project). Meanwhile your colleagues would have been generally nice about what you had written (they weren't really likely to assault you over the photocopier with an attack on your reading of Cicero's De Officiis), and you would have had a couple of letters from readers who had either loved or hated what you had written.

It is happily different now. I already shared with blog readers the process of writing my SPQR and got huge amounts of straight constructive criticism and helpful support online (on everything from the title to the structure of Chapter 9 -- or was it 8 -- that bogged me down for weeks). But I hadnt quite realised how that now went on after the book was published. OK this may sound naff, but I have had such fun getting tweets over Christmas from people who were actually starting to read SPQR, with wonderful pics of it among the Xmas presents, with the family dog and so on.

Quite a lot of the comments were upbeat, happy and complimentary, but there were also some welcome queries and criticisms which I answered as best I could in 140 characters.

Beyond that, of course, you get longer reviews on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com. Now, I have been very lucky in getting some great reviews in the prints for SPQR, and have been extremely grateful  for them (for criticisms as well as praise). But it is also wonderful to read, as you couldn't access before, the comments of those who simply chose to read it. To put it bluntly, what did those who were not paid (albeit only a little -- reviewing is not a lucrative business) to think and comment, think about what they had actually paid to read?

Obviously it is nice to have the pats on the back (I am very grateful to them -- thanks all); but it is also good to read the criticisms of those who have read the book carefully and disagreed (even the discussion of whether you should use BC/AD or BCE/CE is not unworthwhile). Unsurprisingly though there is still a bit of the usual 'below the line' stuff. That partly offers an uncomfortable insight into how some people (wilfully)  process what you write. I couldn't work out why I was accused of attacking the "State of Israel", until I realised that it was some strange version of my observation that Cicero's words against Catiline (Quousque tandem..?) had recently been used against any number of modern targets, including the State of Israel (I also named the President of Syria as another target); and I still haven't worked out where I have brought in the Vietnam War (though maybe I did..?). And one guy decided that the only reason that there were any five star reviews of the book at all was because they were not entirely 'independent' (an insult to my intelligence as much as to my moral probity -- you would have to be mad to do, as is reported, 'an Orlando Figes').

But in the midst of some predictable jibes -- about how "Cambridge ought to do better than this" or "Afraid Mary is more of a frustrated political activist with a soft nest of tenure at a long established English university that allows her to cast not so subtle political opinions into a purported "history"" -- there was some even more predictably gendered stuff. When I (OK, a bit obsessively) looked at the reviews on Amazon.com yesterday, I saw a comment which said that I should go to the hairdresser. You've got to laugh, I thought... in a BOOK  review!

When I went back today that particular review seemed to have diappeared. I guess the good news is that even the angry poster thought better of it. Thank you, whoever you are, all is forgiven.