THE Group for Authors! discussion

I have an odd situation and am looking for guidance.

A while back I received a 5-star review from an outfit called Readers' Favorite. They don't post their reviews to Goodreads, but suggest that we can use the “my review” section of our book’s Goodreads page to quote excerpts and provide a link to their review. So, I did that. I made sure not to give “my review” any stars, and to make it abundantly clear that the review was written by someone else.

Nevertheless, a few days later, someone left a comment accusing me of giving myself a 5-star rating. (Specifically: “How odd that someone with the same name as the author gave the book 5 stars.”) That was a false accusation; I gave myself a zero-star rating, *specifically* to avoid the slightest whiff of impropriety. I responded politely to the comment, but that user has never been back to acknowledge his error or remove his comment. As such, anyone who visits my page will see his untrue accusation.

On the book’s Goodreads page, it looks like I have the ability to delete his comment myself (there's a little "delete" button next to it), but I don't want to run afoul of any ethical guidelines by which authors should not be removing comments from readers. Also, I assume he’d be alerted to the fact that his comment was deleted, and I am not at all eager to start a negative engagement with a reader.

Please understand, if his comment were simply that he didn't like the book, I'd have no problem with that. But I take exception to what amounts to a patently untrue smear of my character, sitting there near the top of my book’s page.

Do you have any suggestions as to if and how I should proceed?

Many thanks,
-Dorian Hart

GR policy is to contact GR support. GR do not like threads that can link individuals so you are better off to delete this thread and contact support.

Edit: see here for other info

https://www.goodreads.com/author/guid...

Thanks for the advice!

D.A., it does not appear that one can flag a comment as inappropriate; I'd have to flag my own review!

I actually sent an e-mail to someone at Goodreads a couple of months ago and never heard back, so I figured it was a minor enough deal not to get on their radar; thus, me looking to the community for advice. But I'll try sending them a message again and see what happens.

Once I get even the slightest traction through some other channel, I'll delete this post. My goal is not to get the commenter in trouble, but to remove the content from my page in a way Goodreads considers ethically sound. (As for "slander," I was merely using the term for its general meaning ("make false statements about a person") -- I'm not looking for a lawsuit!

-Dorian

Dorian wrote: "Thanks for the advice!

D.A., it does not appear that one can flag a comment as inappropriate; I'd have to flag my own review!

I actually sent an e-mail to someone at Goodreads a couple of months ..."

I'll just second D.A's advice here, nothing wrong with deleting a comment on your "review", if/when you decide you want to do that. And blocking the user, if you want, is also a good idea.

D.A. • shelf! Shelf! SHELF! wrote: "Huh. I didn't realize authors couldn't flag comments on their reviews, everyone else can. Are you looking at the comment on the book page in with all the review abstracts or looking at comments whe..."

Ah, thank you! I was looking at the former, but there is in fact a "flag" button on the latter. (Of course, Goodreads throws up a dire-sounding "only use the Flag for something serious!" message when I go to use it, so I haven't yet. I'm not sure this issues rises to the level of severity that "flag" is meant for.) In the meantime I have sent Goodreads a more generic feedback message; I'll wait to hear what they say.

Thanks!

It would, theoretically speaking, be libel and not slander (unless they posted an audio file); "libel" is used to describe a written defamatory statement, and "slander" an oral defamatory statement.

I deleted all my previous posts so author could remove thread ( the missing conversation discussed slander versus libel and the issue was partly not seeing flag option because viewing community review abstracts on book page rather than viewing their full review).

LOL, "slander" catches a lot of attention in a thread title ...

@Dorian, my humble opinion is that you remove your 'my review' altogether. You can always use 'Reader's Favorite' review as part of book description or put it as a blog post on GR and elsewhere. I also think it's pretty self-indulgent that authors review their own books and rate them as 5-stars (whether or not you were merely quoting RF; does Stephen King rate his own work?), but to each his own.

I used RF site more than a year ago and got the 3* review which I subsequently posted on my fb page. And I've learnt lessons in spamming or insinuation the hard way.

I encountered a very different kind of problem only recently: a guy who edits/ reviews for RF was spamming (or 'enlightening') authors in a particular review group to use RF, instead of making a separate topic thread, so he was basically just bumping on various author pages and dumping the info. I flagged it, since he has done it on my giveaway page, he argued (of all things) that it was 'his right to help me'! I objected and GR removed his posts but he has kept at it, going on a rampage that he was doing me a favor and he was merely replying to my post! (my thread, my topic, it's a giveaway! and the guy is promoting himself on it, his site, arguing, and thinks it's okay). It was downright disrespectful. So told GR to simply remove his posts from my topic thread (because the mods of that review group have been MIA for 6 months). Don't know what GR will do, but it is this kind of childish nonsense that takes the fun out of being on such a great place as GR.

Noorilhuda wrote: "@Dorian, my humble opinion is that you remove your 'my review' altogether. You can always use 'Reader's Favorite' review as part of book description or put it as a blog post on GR and elsewhere. I ..."

I think you misunderstand... I didn't give my book five stars. I specifically *didn't* give my book *any* stars, because I agree it's self-indulgent at best, unethical at worst.

But this particular commenter *mistakenly* thought I gave it five stars (maybe because in both the 5* and 0* cases, all the stars look the same?) and left a snide comment to that effect.

I'm sorry to hear about that RF guy; it sounds frustrating! At least my RF reviewer has stayed invisible since his review.

Noorilhuda wrote: "You can always use 'Reader's Favorite' review as part of book description"

Actually, no, not on Goodreads. Blog posts are a good idea, though.

Dorian wrote: "I have an odd situation and am looking for guidance.

A while back I received a 5-star review from an outfit called Readers' Favorite. They don't post their reviews to Goodreads, but suggest that w..."
Hi Dorian, I also have had a review from Readers favourite and like you I out the review on my review spot. I have seen a lot of authors post 5 star reviews on their books so I wouldn't worry too much but I would definitely remove the offending comment. I followed readers Favourite advice as you did and you did nothing wrong as the reviewers name is attached to the review not yours.

@Noorilhuda, I think you can ask staff to do something about MIA moderators.

Yeah, D.A. did - no reply / action yet, but thanks.

Just a note from a writer with journalism past: Slander is spoken. When the spoken is written down it transforms to libel.

I would also venture to guess that you own the book, and therefore decide content, which makes you legally responsible, but that is something for the lawyers to fuss about. I would delete it.

Good luck. kevin