Cloud Atlas
question
Any way to rate a book with 1/2 stars?
Chad
Jan 13, 2013 11:59AM
Perhaps this is just nitpicking, but the rating system is not complete to me.
When I rate something, I base it on the descriptors that pop up for each star rating. Now I'm not looking at them right now, so I could be wrong. But I think it goes something like this:
1 star - hated it
2 stars - didn't like it
3 stars - liked it
4 stars - really liked it
5 stars - classic
My problem all seems to be between 2 and 3 stars and 3 and 4 stars (I don't give out many five stars because I feel those are the books you look back on as your favorites or at least recent favorites). I may like a book quite a bit, but see plenty of holes in it. I may not quite like a book, but admire some of what it was trying to do. Now I know that is why we can write reviews, but it bugs me when I look at some of the books I have given 3 stars to when I know I definitely did not feel the same way about them when compared with each other. Thoughts on this? Am I just a book lover with OCD? A Nick Hornby character?
When I rate something, I base it on the descriptors that pop up for each star rating. Now I'm not looking at them right now, so I could be wrong. But I think it goes something like this:
1 star - hated it
2 stars - didn't like it
3 stars - liked it
4 stars - really liked it
5 stars - classic
My problem all seems to be between 2 and 3 stars and 3 and 4 stars (I don't give out many five stars because I feel those are the books you look back on as your favorites or at least recent favorites). I may like a book quite a bit, but see plenty of holes in it. I may not quite like a book, but admire some of what it was trying to do. Now I know that is why we can write reviews, but it bugs me when I look at some of the books I have given 3 stars to when I know I definitely did not feel the same way about them when compared with each other. Thoughts on this? Am I just a book lover with OCD? A Nick Hornby character?
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Would love to have 1/2 stars, but Goodreads is opposed to the idea. Their reasoning doesn't make sense to me, but I guess it does to them.
Half-stars would be nice. Big difference between a "low 3" and a "high 3"!
I also think "I liked it" or "I hated it" is a weak way to rate books. I often enjoy books that aren't particularly "good" in a literary sense and dislike books as a whole even when I can recognize the quality of the writing or plot. Most of the books I've loved most have flaws, or are aquired tastes that I wouldn't necessarily recommend to my friends, but they hit the spot for me. Based on the ratings and rankings for books like Twilight, many people on this site confuse "stimulated my dopamine receptors" with "is the pinnacle of human achievement!!"
I'm also extremely picky with which books earn 5 stars from me (although for me, Cloud Atlas was one of them ;) )
I also think "I liked it" or "I hated it" is a weak way to rate books. I often enjoy books that aren't particularly "good" in a literary sense and dislike books as a whole even when I can recognize the quality of the writing or plot. Most of the books I've loved most have flaws, or are aquired tastes that I wouldn't necessarily recommend to my friends, but they hit the spot for me. Based on the ratings and rankings for books like Twilight, many people on this site confuse "stimulated my dopamine receptors" with "is the pinnacle of human achievement!!"
I'm also extremely picky with which books earn 5 stars from me (although for me, Cloud Atlas was one of them ;) )
There is no reason why a rating scale cannot be 10 points as opposed to 5 points. My question would be why would you want to do it.
It would not necessarily add new information. I suspect that Goodreads ratings are not distributed evenly for a given book, but are instead biased towards higher ratings. Why? Because people can either not begin books that they expect to dislike or else can stop reading a book early on and not spend too much time on a stinker. So a half-star rating will look a lot like a one star rating in the overall distribution. Besides, it is hard to convey much real information about something as complicated as a novel in a five point scale. Your real assessment is in the written review if you want to provide detail, isn't it? Even Roger Ebert does thumbs up or thumbs down ratings on movies - a two point scale.
I have trouble seeing how the authors will care, especially if their book is popular and widely read, such as Cloud Atlas. If you were an editor and wanted to kill a stinker before it was published, that is another matter, but then it would also depend on what you wrote in a review rather than just the simple rating.
In the interests of full disclosure, I enjoyed Cloud Atlas, although I found it difficult and am not an active reader of fiction. I tend not to make recommendations to friends, however, since I wish them to remain my friends, even though their reading tastes may differ from mine. I also suspect that my enemies would not care about what I recommended.
It would not necessarily add new information. I suspect that Goodreads ratings are not distributed evenly for a given book, but are instead biased towards higher ratings. Why? Because people can either not begin books that they expect to dislike or else can stop reading a book early on and not spend too much time on a stinker. So a half-star rating will look a lot like a one star rating in the overall distribution. Besides, it is hard to convey much real information about something as complicated as a novel in a five point scale. Your real assessment is in the written review if you want to provide detail, isn't it? Even Roger Ebert does thumbs up or thumbs down ratings on movies - a two point scale.
I have trouble seeing how the authors will care, especially if their book is popular and widely read, such as Cloud Atlas. If you were an editor and wanted to kill a stinker before it was published, that is another matter, but then it would also depend on what you wrote in a review rather than just the simple rating.
In the interests of full disclosure, I enjoyed Cloud Atlas, although I found it difficult and am not an active reader of fiction. I tend not to make recommendations to friends, however, since I wish them to remain my friends, even though their reading tastes may differ from mine. I also suspect that my enemies would not care about what I recommended.
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