Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

Just posting because I'm curious - and I disagree with Goodreads rating guidelines.

5 stars - I save for my absolute favorites. The books I could read over and over again. Harry Potter, Memoirs of a Geisha, books I loved as a child. I recently rated The Nightingale and Me Before You 5 stars this year as well, simply because they affected me after I had finished the last page.
4 stars - Where most of the books I read end up. I really liked and would recommend.
3 stars - Eh, just okay. Didn't dislike, but wouldn't recommend.
2 stars - Did not like.
1 star - Absolutely hated it.

Lindi wrote: "Just posting because I'm curious - and I disagree with Goodreads rating guidelines.

5 stars - I save for my absolute favorites. The books I could read over and over again. Harry Potter, [..."

I use the same ratings. Most of my books are 4 stars. Ocassional 5's or 3's. Rare 1's and 2's (mostly because I probably didn't finish it if I didn't like it that much).

1 star - hated it, why did I read this, I should have DNF'd it.

2 star - had some ok parts

3 stars - most my books are three stars. I enjoyed reading it but nothing about it blew me away.

4 star - wow, this is pretty good!

5 stars - amazing

Mostly ratings just reflect my enjoyment level I got from the book. And typically the second I get done with the book is when I rate it on goodreads. And man-oh-man I wish goodreads did half stars!

Same as you, I have a handful of 5 which are ones I loved and would/could read over and over. 4 I liked/loved and would recommend to friends. 3 I either felt meh about or I liked the story but the writing was bad or vice versa, 2 I did not like, would not recommend. I have very very few 1 books; I would have to really think the story and writing were just awful, they'd probably be books I couldn't finish (which is a huge deal for me because I generally am compelled to finish even bad books once I start lol)

I think I only have one, 1 star book on my list, The Edge of Always. I enjoyed the first book for what is was - new adult romance. But every page of the sequel I was actually mad about how unnecessary and dumb a sequel was.

Every page I turned I was relieved that I was one page closer to finishing it.

I feel compelled to finish bad books, but that one was a test.

I like pretty much every book I read, so I give them four or five stars, usually. Even if it's not something I normally read, there's always something I'm going to like about it. I haven't had to give any books only one or two stars so far!

Here are my own rating guidelines:

5-Star books are those with skillfully constructed writing, compelling characterization, an engaging plot. They have fascinating settings (time and place) created through descriptive language that evokes vivid sights, sounds, and other sensations. They put me in a mood, make me question previously held assumptions, and/or have a strong emotional impact.

4-Star books account for most of the books I read. They have most of the elements of a 5-Star book, but may have some shortcomings. They are books that I “like” and would recommend.

3-Star books are lacking more than a few qualities found in higher rated books. Still, these books contain at least one element of storytelling that makes them worth reading. In this (3-Star) category, I also include books that are well-written, but have something that makes them impossible for me, personally, to recommend. (In other words, I found them personally offensive, or morally without merit, albeit well-written.)

2-Star books are boring, silly, unbelievable, officious, puffed-up, irrelevant, and/or meaningless.

1-Star books are a waste of time and money. I rarely finish reading 1-Star books and never review them.

On a 1-5 scale, 3 is average, so every books starts at a 3. I tend to rate books more on how much I enjoyed them rather than how "good" they are. Yes I know there is a difference.

If it was an acceptable use of my time, you get a 3. If I quite liked it, 4. Loved is a 5. A 2 really put me off somehow and a 1 makes me question how it was even published.

Goodreads says my average rating is 3.8

I rate my books based on my enjoyment AND the quality.

I might really eat up and enjoy a cheesy romance, but the quality would bring it down a notch for me.
Likewise, some classics that I did not enjoy might get a slightly higher rating.

Yeah I do that too. But, I decided ages ago I was rating them for myself to look back on, not for everyone else. I give more weight to my enjoyment and it's also the tie-breaker in a half-star situation. :)

I rate based solely on my enjoyment. One or two stars higher or lower will not statistically affect the book's overall rating when it is one of thousands of ratings.

Enjoyment and quality of writing.

I didn't even know that Goodreads had rating guidelines!! My ratings are for me, so too bad with whatever GR wants. I rate based on how much I enjoyed the book; so a fluffy romance can get 5 stars from me, but if I had high expectations in a book, and I was disappointed, my rating is going to be lower than if I had no expectations at all. I don't feel guilty since that sort of thing pretty much only happens with popular books that are getting a ton of buzz.

5 stars: excellent!
4 stars: very good
3 stars: good
2 stars: okay
1 star: did not like it at all

Two years ago I started keeping track of my ratings and plotting them - they follow a bell curve generally centered on 3.5-4, so I'm not biasing my ratings one way or the other :-)

5: I really enjoyed the book. It is one that I want to reread. It also might have made me think about something is a new way. There was something special about the book for me.
4: It was a good book that I enjoyed. (Most books fall here, I'm not overcritical about books).
3: It is a decent book but I was bored or confused while reading.
2: It is a bit of a mess.
1: The author really annoyed me. It could be poor research, unbelievable story-line, terrible editing or it just ticked me off. ( I don't have many 1* books. I also only use this for popular authors/books. If it is a less know author then the book would end up as a 2 since some of the problems may stem from a lack of resources where as a very popular author does not have the same excuse).
I also have quite a few books that I don't rate. This generally means that the book really fluctuated between 2-4 stars and a 3 star does not make sense. I also use it if, I'm not sure if my enjoyment is more about me than the book.

I'm kind of a mix of everyone here.

Most of my books end up as a 3 star. I agree with poshpenny that everything starts at a 3 and has to work its way up, or falls short from there.

I rate very few books at 5 stars. Examples are The Nightingale, Just Kids and, of course, The Great Gatsby. I read 62 books last year and only 4 ended up getting 5 stars.

My average rating according to GR was 3.0.

The only time I rate something 1 star is if it's so awful that I can't even finish it. It's rare that I hate something so much that I quit reading.

2 stars - Strongly disliked and wouldn't recommend it to anyone. It's not often that I read something that I dislike so much so I usually remember these and tell people NOT to read them!

3 stars - It's fine. Nothing special about it but I liked it. I probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone unless there was a specific reason I think they would like it. These tend to be forgettable books.

4 stars - A good, solid read that I would recommend to others.

5 stars - Reserved for the best of the best. These are the books that I rave about to anyone who will listen or books who had a significant impact on me.

olá. I rate the books I read basing on my expectations and surprises that the stories gave to me: 4-5* I never expected a story like this;1-2* I just read something souding the same story;3* it's ok, but...

Great question. I was thinking about it recently when I started to realize that I felt conflicted about rating certain books (ie. some of the classics). My rating system is a mix of quality and enjoyment, with a bit more weight on the enjoyment side. In general, I find my perception of the quality of a book is influenced by how much I enjoyed it. But, that does lead to some guilt when it comes to classics since it's hard for me to give them a lower rating knowing that they are commonly considered great books.

In general, this is my system:

5 stars - Excellent book overall, memorable, and left some kind of impact on me. It is a book I would highly recommend. I was compelled to keep reading.

4 stars - Really enjoyed the plot and/or character development. I would recommend it but it did not have much of an impact on me.

3 stars - Mediocre. Interesting plot or interesting characters (but generally not both). Took me a long time to get through or was boring/hard to read.

2 stars - Disliked. Several serious flaws that get in the way of my enjoyment of the book (ie. very repetitive, weak plot/characters, boring)

1 star - Hated it. I almost never rate something this low.

5 stars - A favorite, or just a book that I will remember fondly for a long time.

4 stars - Really enjoyed the book, but would not consider it a favorite. Tends not to be as memorable. Would recommend to the right audience.

3 stars - This is definitely my most widely used category. It can mean that I liked the book but didn't find anything special about it. It can mean that I found the book dull but well written. Basically, there's some literary merit to these books.

2 stars - Disliked this book but acknowledge that I either was not the target audience, or that the book could have been better.

1 star - Hated it.

I think of an author's writing as their art (I mean that in the least clichéd way possible). As an artist my goal was always to give my audience an emotional response to my work. This is how I look at an author's writing.
If a book gives me a really strong emotional response I give it 5 stars. Two examples are the cringe-worthy and emotionally disturbing American Psycho and the cry-my-eyes-out Petals on the Wind (no making fun of me for that one, I know a lot of people hated it). I also tend to give 5 stars to books that raise philosophical questions or leave a strong impression on me. Two examples here would be Speaker for the Dead and Shine: Using Brain Science to Get the Best from Your People

The rest is pretty similar to everyone else.
4 stars: I really enjoyed it and I found it to be unique.
3 stars: It's good.
2 stars: I did not like the writing style, or had problems with the plot/story-line. Most likely I had to force myself to finish.
1 star: Honestly I haven't rated any books with 1 star.

I had no idea that GR had rating guidelines. Where did you find that?

5 stars - Absolutely knock-outs. I will likely never stop talking about these until someone tapes my mouth shut! A book with some problems can still end up in this category if it affects me enough.
4 stars - There is something special about these that brings them up from 3 stars. Could be any number of things. People will likely be hearing about this group a lot.
3 stars - Most books are here. Enjoyed, but not particularly.
2 stars - Eh, didn't really care for. Could be for story reasons, or if it was an interesting story, but poor writing (or a style I don't like).
1 star - Absolutely hated it. People will likely get tired of hearing me talk about how awful it was. I still finished it though. Haha

I don't really do written reviews much. I honestly don't like trying to "justify" my feelings on anything, especially something I'm emotionally attached to as books. So I pretty much just go with the stars and leave it to that.

1 star - could not finish
2 stars - I finished, but couldn't say I enjoyed the experience
3 stars - Enjoyed, but not sure I would recommend it to someone else
4 stars - Great fun! Would recommend
5 stars - So good, it made me cry or laugh out loud or had me thinking about it for days and weeks after.

My ratings are comparable to most I think:

5 stars - highly recommend, loved it, would read again, basically have little or no criticism about it, exceptional all around.
4 stars -- excellent read but had a quibble of some kind.
3 stars -- good, enjoyed, might even recommend in right circustances, but just an okay read - usually have a couple of quibbles (i.e. disliked narrator or protagonist intensely) or has something really strong that raises it above 2 star.
2 stars - Has something seriously wrong with it, i.e. poor writing, terrible plotting, etc. Or has at least one redeeming quality. I gave Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel a 2 star rating because I found her actual writing to be so terrible it was distracting, but thought the overall premise - Tudor England from Cromwell's POV to be redeeming.
1 star -- equivalent of a no star - terrible. hated it. nothing to redeem it at all.

Unlike most people here, I found that a 5 star maximum didn't have enough flexibility for me, so some years ago I adopted a 6-star rating:

6 stars: only awarded to books that I would class as a favourite.
5 stars: an excellent book, but one that I just can't call a favourite.
4 stars: good read, hard to put down
3 stars: OK, but not unputdownable
2 stars: disappointing - didn't really get on with it. May be unfinished or skimmed
1 star: ugh! Usually unfinished.

Of the 800+ books I've rated (most from the past decade, but some favourites from aeons ago!), the split is:

6 stars - 13.5% (111 - 70 fiction, 34 non-fiction, 7 children's books)
5 stars - 18.5%
4 stars - 28.5%
3 stars - 26.5%
2 stars - 8%
1 star - 5%

The average grade is 3.9 - so slightly skewed upwards, but one would expect that, as book choice isn't exactly random. When I don't have a choice (e.g. reading group selections) then the proportions of lower grades increases. The average is also skewed because the 6-star grade includes ALL my favourites, even from beyond when I started grading each read. The proportion of 6-star books has gone down each year, as rarely more than 4-5% new reads are rated at 6-stars.

Most 6-star books are graded at 5 to start with and upped to 6 later, as a book can take time to grown on me. A few are 'instant' favourites. Considering the previous post by Theresa, Wolf Hall was one of my instant 6-star books and, years later, still ranks in my top dozen or so books! One or two series are rated as favourites, even if individual books in the series may not achieve that grade.

My rating philosophy is mostly based on tge books worth or enjoyment vs. annoyance ratio.

I give out five stars a lot because I do not reserve it for favorites. I have a favorites shelf for that. Five star is anything that I loved, enjoyed, or kept me thinking for a while.

My overall average is 4.12. I pick mostly books I would so they end up 4 or 5. Most books 3 or below were books I read for a book club or were picked for me some other way than me researching them.

My guidelines:
5 - I really enjoyed this book, or it was very worthwhile. It had no significant distracting issues.
4 - I enjoyed it or it was worthwhile, with a few minor issues.
3 - It was meh, or it was good but with major flaws. For example, Moby Dick had great moments but was also tedious.
2 - Was not for me but others might like it. Too many annoyances to enjoy.
1 - Something annoyed the hell out of me in this book and I recommend others to stay away from it. I rarely give this because I usually do not finish the book if I don't like it.

Will wrote: "The average grade is 3.9 - so slightly skewed upwards, but one would expect that, as book choice isn't exactly random. When I don't have a choice (e.g. reading group selections) then the proportions of lower grades increases.."

Same here! I almost always rate books I pick 4 or 5. My 1,2,3 are book club picks or classics I don't end up liking.

5 stars- I'M IN LOVE WITH THIS BOOK
4 stars- Wow, this is really good
3 stars- It's okay
2 stars- I don't care
1 star- I hate it

Will wrote: "Unlike most people here, I found that a 5 star maximum didn't have enough flexibility for me, so some years ago I adopted a 6-star rating:

6 stars: only awarded to books that I would class as a fa..."

How do you handle your 1-to-6-star rating scale on Goodreads?

5 Stars - LOVE LOVE LOVE
4 stars - Like/Love it, but not enough to love love love it
3 stars - I liked it. It was okay and kept me entertained
2 stars - meh. I got through it.
1 star - why did i let myself read this book omg

Here is how I do my rating
5 stars-Loved everything about it!
4 stars - Really enjoyed, may have been a couple things I didn't like that prevented a 5 star rating
3 stars - Was okay, probably wouldn't recommend.
2 stars - a couple things I liked but overall did not like
1 star - Hated it

5 Stars - Love and will probably re-read in the future.
4 Stars - Liked a lot, would recommend, but probably would not re-read
3 Stars - No strong feelings one way or the other, would not recommend.
2 Stars - Finished it, but rated between did not like to hate.
1 Star - Hate it, probably did not finish it, it was too awful.

poshpenny wrote: "If it was an acceptable use of my time, you get a 3. If I quite liked it, 4. Loved is a 5. A 2 really put me off somehow and a 1 makes me question how it was even published."

This is pretty much exactly how I rate too. 3 is the middle and books move up or down from that. 4 is something I'd recommend, 5 is something I loved - 2 is bad, 1 is dreadful.

GR says my average is 3.09.

5: Phenomenal book; one I really enjoyed
4: Good kept me entertained and generally wanting to read more but didn't keep me up at night reading it
3: Ok, decent (This is where most books lately end up)
2: Didn't like but not bad enough not to finish
1: So bad I did not finish or So disturbing I couldn't finish

I don't re-read books.

I rate by considering my enjoyment and overall quality.

5 stars - Truly a favorite. I probably re-read it immediately after finishing it the first time and am always looking for people to recommend it to.

4 stars - Loved it. Will probably reread. Highly recommend.

3 stars - Liked it. Probably won't reread. Will recommend based on other readers likes and dislikes. Lately this is where most books end up.

2 stars - Did not like. Will recommend based on other readers likes and dislikes. Perfect example: I did not like "In the Woods" by Tana French. There were 2 issues that just had me so annoyed by the time it ended. Ugh - I could not go higher than 2 even though it was well written because I did not enjoy reading it. But I could think of several people with different taste in book than me who might love it.

1 star - Absolutely hated it. I will rate a DNF if I read 50% before quitting. Most of my 1 stars are DNFs or books I only finished because of book club.

Unrated - DNFs less than 50% complete.

My average rating is a 3.40.

5 stars are the best books! I loved them. 4 stars I liked it a lot, really enjoyed it. 3 it was ok, still liked the over all story but has problems. 2 meh. 1 star hate it , dnf.

5 stars usually means I couldn't put it down and finished it in 24 hours if I had the time, or it was just amaaazing. I'll also change a rating to a 5 if I can't stop thinking about the story and the characters.

4 stars I loved it and wouldn't mind reading more, but I didn't walk away with a book high. Sometimes I take a star off if serious editing was needed, but I like to look at the creativity and story that the writer built, and try not to hold the bad editing, or lack thereof, against them. If they wrote something fun, entertaining, or that had a big impact on me, I'll base the rating on that.

3 stars I thought it was good, but the story was either flat, or I just couldn't connect with the characters. I also give lower stars if I have a harder time visualizing what I'm reading. I like my books to play like movies in my mind.

2 stars I was disappointed, bored, or just frustrated with how dumb the main character was.

1 star if it didn't make sense, wasn't legible, or included a scene that was beyond what I can handle being burned into my brain.

Nadine wrote: "How do you handle your 1-to-6-star rating scale on Goodreads? "

Sorry to take so long to reply (will you even see this now?).
The simple answer is I don't - I find Goodreads too restrictive in the way it handles ratings (and, TBH, I don't like the cataloguing system full stop). I therefore catalogue all my books on LibraryThing, which allows half star ratings, so there I use 3.5 for 4-star books. Whilst I prefer LT for cataloguing anyway, I find Goodreads a more lively, interesting forum for discussion (except in or two specialist areas), so split my browsing across the two sites.

Thinking about it, I think I'd conflate my 1 and 2 star grades into 1 star: they only represent 5 and 8% of my reading respectively, so even together, at 13%, would still be, just, the least frequent rating. So:

5-star: all-time favourite list
4-star: excellent, but not that extra spark to be a favourite
3-star: good read, hard to put down
2-star: OK, but not unputdownable
1-star: books that disappointed, including the dross

I agree with most of the people on here when I say that I only give 5 stars to my absolute favorite, will most definitely if I haven't already, read again books. For example, This is How It Always Is or the one I'm currently rereading All the Ugly and Wonderful Things.
4 stars goes to books that were really good or that I really enjoyed but didn't make my heart soar or whatever happened in the 5 stars books.
3 stars goes to most of the books I read meaning they were good but not that amazing.
2 stars is meh
1 star is I don't even know how or why I finished this book

5 stars: loved it, will probably wind up being one of those favorite books I come back to again and again, found the writing ingenious and well-crafted, was highly entertained...
4 stars: didn't love it, but I did really like/enjoy it, it had a lot of bright spots, and I'll probably wind up rereading it at some point
3 stars: this tends to be the widest variety for me, because this can vary from "I liked it but didn't love it" to "I liked these elements, but these other things didn't work for me"...stuff like that.
2 stars: my "meh" rating. It was okay; not bad, but not something I would revisit or recommend.
1 star: books I strongly disliked, felt like my time had been wasted when I finished them (like seeing a bad movie and wishing you hadn't spent the viewing time on it) and/or were poorly crafted IMO.

I get so excited after finishing a book that I always wanted to rate them 4's and 5's so I had to come up with my own rating method based on how I would recommend:

5: would recommend everyone read it, absolutely love
4: would recommend to people I think would enjoy it
3: indifferent - would not recommend or deter others
2: would deter others from reading when asked
1: would actively deter people from reading

For me, 4 and 5 star books are favourites. I think what divides them is maybe more about where I am in terms of life and mood when I read them. A 5 star book is not just great but I also read it at the exact right time. A 4 star book is great but I just didn't connect to it in the same way.

3 star is probably my most frequent rating. It's a really good, enjoyable fluff book or a book that I thought was good and worth reading. I'd still recommend these books because they were worth the read but they weren't my favourites.

2 star isn't good. I didn't much like it and I don't think it was well written.

1 star is a book I hated. Could be poorly written or I hated the ideas contained within.

I love this conversation!

5 star: Not only did I absolutely love this on a purely subjective level, but I also think it is legitimately great on a more objective level (solid writing, characterization, pacing, etc.). I will press it on others with an evangelical fervor. I almost never give this rating.
4 star: I liked this a lot and thought it was good. I would recommend this to lots of people.
3 star: My most ambiguous rating - I use this to mean both "I enjoyed it; it was fine but unremarkable; I would recommend it only to people whose taste is already very similar to my own" and "I didn't particularly enjoy this, but I think that's probably because it's simply not to my specific tastes; I would recommend it to people whose tastes I thought it matched."
2 star: I didn't like this, but I finished it. If asked about it, I would say something like "It definitely wasn't for me," and if pressed, I would give a generally negative review.
1 star: I hated this and would not recommend it. Since I'm a big fan of DNF'ing books and I don't give star-ratings to books I DNF, I rarely give 1-star reviews.

I loathe that GoodReads doesn't allow half-star ratings, since for me, there's a huge difference between a 3-star book and a 3.5-start book.

5 - A life changing novel, must read!
4 - Very good novel, surely recommend it
3 - Meh
2 or 1 - I ussually drop books that I don't like, so I've never rated a book this low, I even switch them from "currently reading" to "want to read" and then delete them from my TBR list

5 - Amazing and wonderful, I do have a decent number of books here, mostly because I research books extensively before reading them. I volunteer this book to read in a conversation.
4 - Really good but probably wouldn't read again, usually something about the book makes me not want to give it 5 stars. I volunteer this book to read when prompted with a parameter.
3 - I liked the book. I did. But I figured out the ending, or I liked the story but hated the characters, or the writing was lacking.
2 - I really didn't like the book or the ending ruined it.
1 - DNF only.

Interesting thread, thanks for asking the question

My rating system:
5. I either laughed out loud, cried a few tears, or both
4. Enjoyed the book
3. Okay, but there were moments that had me annoyed
2. Hated it! But since I did finish it, there was something that kept me going
1. Did not finish and will not try again. Sometimes I do not finish a book, just because it wasn't the right time for me to read that book. In that case I don't rate it, but I move to book to a specific shelf

And I totally agree that we should be allowed to give half star ratings, or give a score from 1 to 10! Especially between the 3 and 4 I regularly miss a 3.5

Awesome topic! I've often wondered that myself.

I will preface this by saying that I believe there are basically 2 types of readers: those who wish to experience great literature and quality writing (people who love authors like Jane Austen, Leo Tolstoy, Charles Dickens et al.) and those who read for sheer enjoyment. I am not afraid to admit that I am definitely in the latter category. While the quality of writing does become a factor in my ratings it is not something I exclusively focus on (case in point - I never managed to get through The Pride and Prejudice, but I loved The Hunger Games series). My rating system is quite impulsive - based largely on my enjoyment of the book, how engaging I found it (the 'unputdownable' factor) and the impact it had on me once I finished. There will be books that are 5 stars that fit each of these criteria and there will be some that only lived up the coveted 5 star status in a couple of them.

5 - wow, amazing, finished in a blink of an eye, can't stop talking it about it and recommend to anyone who would listen (ie. The Nightingale, A Thousand Splendid Suns, The Art of Racing in the Rain, The Rosie Project, but also basically anything by Dan Brown - further supporting my point above re:quality being a secondary factor)

4 - where most of my books end up - loved it, but it didn't blow me away or it took a while to finish. I would still recommend it, but would not rave about it

3 - liked it, didn't love it - may or may not recommend. Some of the guilty pleasure reads will fall in this category or perhaps some that I found very well written that just didn't captivate me enough to finish quicker

2 - did not like AT ALL and would likely talk about how much I disliked it (ie. Fifty Shades of Grey)

1 - absolutely hated it. Loathe is a word that comes to mind here

Ps. Did anyone else after reading this thread or writing their post go back and change some ratings? Lol

I will preface this by saying that I believe there are basically 2 types of readers: those who wish to experience great literature and quality writing (people who love authors like Jane Austen, Leo Tolstoy, Charles Dickens et al.) and those who read for sheer enjoyment. I am not afraid to admit that I am definitely in the latter category. While the quality of writing does become a factor in my ratings it is not something I exclusively focus on (case in point - I never managed to get through The Pride and Prejudice, but I loved The Hunger Games series).

That division seems to assume that one doesn't read 'quality writing' (however that is defined) for sheer enjoyment. But I do! And the reason I don't like 'bad writing' is that it spoils the enjoyment. A book doesn't have to be a nineteenth-century classic to be good quality either! I suppose it depends on what we mean by terms such as 'quality'. (But, yes, I absolutely hated both Dan Brown books I tried - 1* each, but as much for what I thought was horrible plotting as for the writing. On the other hand I loved The Rosie Project - 5* - bearing in mind that 6* is my top grading).

5 stars: Loved the book! Loved the author! I read the book quickly because I couldn't put it down! I'll definitely read the rest of the series, if there is a series, and I'll look for other books by the author. I hope to reread this book in a few years. I'll recommend this book to anyone I think would enjoy it. (And who wouldn't enjoy this book!?)

4 stars: I really, really enjoyed the book! The author was really good. I'll read the rest of the series if there is one, and I'll probably check out other books by the author. I probably won't reread, though. I may or may not have read this book quickly. I'll recommend it to people I know enjoy this genre.

3 stars: I liked the book enough to completely read it. I may read other books by this author, or other books in the series if I happen to run across them and I have nothing else to read-or if I've read other books by the author that thought were better, I'll give the author another try. It's quite doubtful I'll recommend this book.

2 stars: I liked the book enough to read it through, but wished I hadn't as it was a waste it my time. Usually books that I push myself to read even though I don't like it very much, only to find they end badly. ** As I read more and get older, I gave less of these-life is too short and poorly written or boring books rarely get better.

1 star: I usually reserve this rating for books that have too many grammatical and spelling errors for next to finish reading. I don't like to rate books that I don't finish reading it, but in the case of books with very poor editing, I feel it serves as a warning to other readers. Life is too short.