The Sword and Laser discussion
How do you use the star rating system?
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I base mine more on enjoyment and what I call "reading zone" as opposed to how well-crafted it is. Although, I think that the "well-crafted" bit is what makes it enjoyable. My reading zone is where I ignore everything else and walk around in a bubble while reading. I'm immersed in the world created for me, the reader. If I'm truly enjoying a book, I don't want to stumble out of my reading zone or be shoved out of it by atrocious grammar or spelling (usually self-published books, but some from major publishers have this problem, too) or from the author forgetting what character POV they are writing from. I follow the goodreads hover text for the most part.
This is why I discount the star rating on most books. I use the aggregate score as a filter a bit (under 3.5 with a high number of ratings is usually a warning sign) but other than that the scores aren't used in a consistent enough manner to mean anything to me. Communities also seem to vary in how they score - the fantasy people score about 1/4 to 1/2 star higher than most others for example as I've read a number of reviews where the words imply a good but no more than good book and the rating is 4 stars. Myself, it's easy. Five stars is an engrossing book from start ot finish. One that kept me reading until the wee hours of the morning. Four stars is a very good book that just misses that 'must... read... more' thing and has no real flaws. Three stars is a four star book with one, MAYBE two big flaws (flat characters, plot holes, etc). Two star books have several big flaws and I only finished because they were quick... or I didn't finish. One star? The author should buy all the books and destroy them to keep from besmirching their reputation
If your graph is not a bell curve when doing your yearly stats you're probably doing it wrong
Rick, maybe this is a seperate topic but whats the rule of thumb for anthologies?
1 star - hated it2 star - did not like the book at all, kept checking to see how many pages were left so I could just finish it already
3 star - I liked the book but nothing I would recommend or pay money for
4 star - I really enjoyed the book - recommend it to friends
5 star - I loved this book and recommend it to friends, strangers and probably enemies as well
Cattfish wrote: "Rick, maybe this is a seperate topic but whats the rule of thumb for anthologies?"interesting question. I don't read a lot of them but for me it would be overall impression. If an anthology has 10 stories and 6-7 are 4 star material it's likely to get 4 stars from me even if the other stories are forgettable. But that's a case where the reader of the review needs to understand the limits of having a single score represent a book comprised of several authors' works. Readers can't, when looking at review sources, just blindly sort by star rating.
Rob wrote: "BTW, we've visited this already: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/9..."Damn! I've become too accustomed to google's smart searches, which might have turned that up where my "star rating" and similar searches turned up nothing. *sigh*
Cattfish wrote: "If your graph is not a bell curve when doing your yearly stats you're probably doing it wrong"
I cannot agree with that. I seek out books that are supposed to be good, based on recommendations and ratings, so my ratings are going to be skewed toward the high-end. That's why I'm concerned about how I rate things; I don't want to ding an author just because the book didn't grab me, but was otherwise excellent. Bridge of Birds is a perfect example: it just wasn't the right book for me, though it was well-written.
I don't want to ding an author just because the book didn't grab me, but was otherwise excellent. Bridge of Birds is a perfect example: it just wasn't the right book for me, though it was well-written.This is where i think review readers need to exercise some initiative. No score can ever really represent one's reaction to what's being reviewed. Books are multi-dimensional in nature (characterization, prose style, world building, etc) but scores compress all of that to one dimension, from worse to best. There's no way a score can capture all of that and that limitation doesn't even get into other issues such as how certain groups are represented (Bechdel test for female characters, etc).
All of that is why I skip over most individual scores. I'll use the aggregate as a rough filter and sometimes I'll read the 2 star reviews to see why they didn't like the book since, if those reasons line up with my hot buttons, I'd rather not waste the time and money.
Scott wrote: "1 star - hated it2 star - did not like the book at all, kept checking to see how many pages were left so I could just finish it already
3 star - I liked the book but nothing I would recommend or p..."
That's similar to what I do, I look at the stars as how I'd recommend the book. Obviously this reflects taste and is going to vary greatly but how many people care about how well written a book is if it doesn't have something to grab them.
If I'm using ratings to look at a book on goodreads I look more at comments written then average number of stars, which admittedly I don't do a good job of doing on books I review.
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It took me a bit of effort to find the thread, and I knew it existed remembering the last time this subject came up.
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I don't agree with this at all. Maybe if I was just picking up books at random, but most of the books I read these days are 3 or better, many are 4, and a few will be 5s.
I almost never read a 2 or a 1 (though I have in the past before I was mostly working off recommendations). I try not to pick up books I don't think I'll enjoy, and I'm rarely disappointed. There is just too much out there I haven't read.
Personally, I'm not going to rate a book a 2 simply to balance things out.
I try to be very selective with what I give a 5 too, but that's about it.
So I guess for me:
1-Didn't enjoy reading it at all
2-It was OK.
3-Enjoyable
4-Very Enjoyable
5-Loved it
So I guess I just use what the tooltip says.
I use the stars as suggested by GR:1: didn't like it
2: it was ok
3: liked it
4: really liked it
5: loved it
In practice, very few books get 1 star from me. I really do try to find something redeeming about the books I read (I'm not always successful...). Most get 2-3 stars. There is a fine line between 4 and 5 stars for me and I'm not always self-consistent. Generally a 5-star is something I recommend to everybody and read multiple times and still find myself thinking about, sometimes when I'm reading other things. 4-star is similar but misses in one aspect or another (maybe I know it's not something I'd recommend or maybe I like it a lot but don't find myself wanting to read at all times, staying up at night to do so, or I'm not sure I'd reread it...).
1: Didn't like it and wouldn't recommend it.2: It was okay but I wouldn't re-read it.
3: It was enjoyable.
4: Really liked it and would re-read it.
5: Loved it. Enjoyed it immensely, would re-read it and recommend it.
1 star = BURN THIS PIECE OF WASTED PAPER!2 stars = Throw it across the room in disgust
3 stars = Not bad
4 stars = Pretty f-ing good
5 stars = Finished in one day and will reread countless times
I've recently made four new shelves to supplement my ratings: didn't-finish-but-calling-it-done, didn't-finish-but-may-try-again; downgraded-rating-over-time, upgraded-rating-over-time.One * usually means I hated/did not like it, have no intention of reading it,or probably didn't finish it (I have too many books to read to waste it on things that don't interest me). These usually get placed in the "calling it done" shelf.
Two ** means I may or may not read more by that author or in that series. It means I thought the book was OK. When I do a review (usually because I got it through Library Thing or Goodreads programs), I say what I liked and what I didn't. Usually though, when I do this for a requested review, it's the lowest rating I give. Sometimes it's just not for me, or sometimes it's just not a well put together book.
Three *** means I liked the book and I may or may not continue with the author or series, leaning toward continuing if the series is otherwise well regarded or interesting to me.
My two and three *** rating sometimes shift up or down depending on how I think about the book as time goes on or I regard the series as a whole once I get through them all.
I created these specifically for Hyperion where I liked half the stories but was bored by the rest. I might enjoy it more in another format (I listened to it in audio first) or as I continue the series and can look back on what Simmons built.
Four **** means I liked it a lot and will continue reading more from the author and will usually talk about it whenever there's a conversation about books.
Five ***** means I loved it and I will go out of my way to bring this book up in conversation.
I sometimes downgrade those over time because sometimes I'll look back over several years and I can't for the life of me even remember what the story was about but at the time I know I really liked/loved it. These are the hardest ones for me as I know I loved at the time but probably wouldn't enjoy so much now because my tastes have changed. I usually rate it based on my memory of how I felt at the time but might knock it down a star for perspective.
I really refuse to consider anything other then how i am feeling about a book when i rate it, this sometimes means a book might get a higher or lower rating just by coming around at the right or wrong time. I make no apologies for it though may mention something about it in a review. My personal rating system is, 1 star. I found nothing redeeming in the book. 2 stars, i didn't like it but it wasn't without it's marrits. 3 stars, i liked it but am unlikely to read it again. 4 stars, i liked it and would be happy to come back to more then once. 5 stars, perfect to me or nearly so.
1 = Hate and vitriol.2 = Terrible, but had glimmer of good.
3 = It was fine. I didn't regret reading it.
4 = Very good. Proud to recommend.
5 = I will remember this fondly on my deathbed.
Also, do we comment on threads 8 months dormant? Not sure of this group's culture.
I would prefer to follow the hover-text suggested by the site. What makes a writing 'good'? The answer changes person to person, era to era, and though there are some commonly agreed-upon standards, well, every 50 years, these undergo a radical change. In fact, our own notions undergo radical changes evry 10 years or so. So the best way is to stick to Goodreads hovers, OR, as Joshua posted in the above message. Personally, I follow Joshua's way...
According to the hover-text, this is what each star rating is supposed to mean here on GR:
* : Did not like it
** : It was ok
*** : Liked it
**** : Really liked it
***** : It was amazing
I rarely give 1-star or 5-star ratings, but for different reasons. 1 star just seems too harsh. Even though I didn't like a Foundation or Hyperion, doesn't mean it was a bad book, which is my inconsistent interpretation of any 1-star rating. 5-star ratings are for life-alteringly good works, things that leave me pondering my own existence, or which make me skip my to-read list and grab the next work by that author.
Perversely, when i get to the middle of the scale, I rate it on my enjoyment of the read, how engaging it was, and whether I might consider re-reading it at some later date. I often rate books with moderately good writing but really fun plots and characters at 4 stars, but if I didn't have a lot of fun reading it but the writing and plot and characters were all well done, it sometimes gets only 3 stars.
Am I being unfair to authors whose books just aren't to my taste? It seems the star ratings are about personal taste, so I'm a little conflicted about this. Do you ignore the pop-up text associated with the stars and try to give things ratings based solely one how well-crafted you thought the work was?