Lesley asked Charlie Gallagher:

Hi Charlie, You may not have experienced this but I’ve often wondered how writers cope with reviews that are less than favourable? I review a lot of books and feel I have to be honest if I don’t enjoy a book but I do wonder if it’s a hurtful thing to do, and how writers feel when they read them? I love, love, love your books and long may you continue to dream up the horrific scenarios that you do for your criminals!

Charlie Gallagher I am quite confident in saying that all writers have experienced a bad review!

It hurts like hell at first, these are very personal things that we are putting out into the wild. I can't tell you how much effort goes into making it the best thing I can possibly produce and for someone to write it off in a matter of words and a single lit star was devastating.

I'm delighted to say that it doesn't bother me anymore. I've come to understand the industry and my place in it. What we do is art and the moment you create something that everybody loves is the moment that art dies and we can't have that. I write stories that I love, I do them to the best of my ability and now that I've released a story 19 times, I know that some people will love them too and some will definitely not - and that's absolutely fine.

There are also different types of negative review. Those that just say it wasn't for them are ones that you'll skip over, those that are constructive and break down what they didn't like specifically are the reviews that I will read to see if there's anything that can be learned. A simple example, in the first series I ever did, someone complained that a character used the person's name whenever she was talking to them and that this was jarring. I read it back and I agreed and my dialogue got better in that moment.

I've gone on. What I think I am trying to say is that we need honest feedback. Blowing smoke up my ass is no good to me if there are ways I can be better. I always want my next book to be better than the last and honest feedback from people who know their fiction is a very important part of that.

Thanks for the question - and thanks for the lovely comment. I've also seen your reviews against my books and I thank you for those - reviews, good or bad, are so important and I really appreciate you taking the time.

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