Goodreads Reviewers' Group discussion

I'm relatively new to the reviewing world and I recently gave a bad review and the author (who I will leave anonymous as so not to stoop to his level) made a personal hate campaign against me - trying to discredit me, calling me names, posting strange comments and abuse on all of my other reviews before and since on different platforms (many of which I've had to delete). He's made videos and blog posts about me. He has found my full name and photo and has been splashing it all over the internet. This has been going on for weeks and whilst I was trying to ignore it for a long time, I'm getting really worn down.

Has anyone experienced this before? How do I deal with it? One one hand I'm a bit concerned for my safety, and on the other I don't want to give in to his pathetic behaviour.

That is such a terrible thing to do. When you say a bad review, I hope you have written it in a polite way. If you have and the author just can't take constructive criticism, then there's something really wrong with them. I have never experienced this personally, but a while ago, someone on bookstagram faced the same issue. It got very bad, to the point where the author was attacking her religion and her on a personal level. She then put up the screenshots and made it public, tagging the publisher and also cyber crime authorities. I know you don't want to name them to stoop to their level, but this person has taken your photo and is using it in a negative way. You are just trying to protect yourself and no one has the right to judge you.

It seems like this is more common in the reviewing communities than I had expected. I just felt like I was airing my opinions on the book. It was nothing personal against the author himself.

Take a screenshot of your review and the horrible comments and videos they put up. Have some people report them. If you don't want to make it public, let some of your friends and family members know and let them report the content. I would still ask you to take a firm action, because if this person can't take simple criticism then they have no business writing books. Not everyone is going to like it. Everyone has different tastes, you just need to take it in your stride and learn from it.

If it's on Instagram, then put it up in your stories.

Since it's on waterstones, you could report the author to them. I have heard they are good at dealing with this kind of thing. They may remove his book for a while, restrict his account, or something else until the matter is resolved. You should absolutely take screenshots of your review, his replies, and keep hold of them or post them somewhere. I hear often of authors bashing reviewers and then deleting their writings after being caught out using fake accounts etc, best to keep records

Can I have a link to your original review? This is purely out of self-interest, I am interested in brutally honest reviewers for my own reasons

Hi Diane,

I'm so sorry you're going through that. I typically just cry into my coffee when I get haters. But crazy is basically all around us & I'd encourage you to push through it and keep living your life as normally as possible.

I'm sharing with you this article about another crazy person. I really hope it doesn't go this far for you: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/te...

But there are some tips in here about dealing with an online campaign of vengeance. If it's isolated to one forum (not like the person in the article), consider whether you just want to let it go & move on with life. (That is if his stuff is isolated to just Waterstones & it's not a site you deeply care about). Wait a month or two and see if he's stopped lurking.

In terms of reviews, I tend to be gentler with indie authors, just because I "feel their pain" and simply don't review stuff I DNF. If I am able to finish a book, then it's at least a 3-star for me, which hardly qualifies as a "bad" review that someone should initiate a hate campaign against me (but stranger things have happened for sure!). If I pay a lot for a book that disappoints me, then I will pop in a bad review -- to me, that's almost like a PSA for other potential purchasers. Sounds like you were trying to do the same thing in terms of trigger warnings ... but this author went a little batty.

Good luck!
Best,
Laura

"https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/te..."

Wow, this is crazy! I really hope he doesn't go that far. Then again, although he writes under a pen name, he has openly been posting videos about me - so that should make it a bit easier for police to track him down if he doesn't quit. Considering he claims to have been writing for over 30 years, yet is unwilling to reveal his identity, I wouldnt be surprised if he has pulled these kind of shenanigans before.

Thank you everyone for the advice so far! It's very helpful.

I would advise you to talk to the police about it as soon as possible. There's a link below.

https://www.met.police.uk/advice/advi...

I am so sorry you are dealing with this. As a reviewer you are allowed you opinion and to publish it. I checked out the author in question and saw some of his posts and he is being so cruel and manipulative.

I hope you can get it to stop. Definitely report him where you can and contact the police. What hes doing is not right.

I've written a few reviews. These are all good, because if I don't like a book I don't bother finishing it, and if I don't finish a book I've got no right to review it.

But even if I like a book, I still send my draft review to the author first. If he doesn't like it, I don't post it. Being an author is hard enough without unnecessary grit in the gears.

Bob wrote: "I've written a few reviews. These are all good, because if I don't like a book I don't bother finishing it, and if I don't finish a book I've got no right to review it.

But even if I like a book, ..."

That's the right approach, imho. If you can't give three stars don't bother posting at all.

I have, sort of. I reviewed a book that was so bad that the main character's name somehow changed from Stacey to Sharon and back to Stacey all within 4 pages. If there was any editing or proofreading the author should have demanded their money back because the misspelling and grammar were everywhere, and the description of one of the male characters went from him having auburn hair to (just a couple of chapters later) having the blond highlights in his hair gleaming in the sun. I was nice but honest in my review, even mentioned that the story had potential if it was put through some serious proofreading to keep the characters consistent. I even ran it by a couple people before posting it. This woman literally harassed me via email and social media. It only stopped after I threatened to make all of her messages public and ruin her public persona. I stopped being nice and told her that if she wants to be successful as an author, she needs to grow thicker skin and most importantly... she needs to actually use proofreading and editing services because she obviously failed English in school.

I get not wanting to stoop to his level, but if you want the harassment to stop, you need to take the steps necessary to make him stop. If that means outing his behavior, you out his behavior so that he learns that that sort of behavior is not acceptable

Bob wrote: "...even if I like a book, I still send my draft review to the author first. If he doesn't like it, I don't post it. Being an author is hard enough without unnecessary grit in the gears.."

Dear Bob,
Thank you for your careful approach to the reviews. If I review books I will apply something like this.

In addition, there is a great recourse about how to write reviews:
https://readingladies.com/2019/01/12/...

A few words to our readers:

As an newbie indie author I have a variety of opinions about my first novel in The Salamander series - from 5 to 1 stars as on Amazon as on Goodreads. There is an interesting 1 star review on Goodreads - so interesting that I would want to read my book #1 again and again!

Nowadays if I am interesting in a book, I read 1 star reviews first. Sometimes, an exquisitely written even negative review might be more real book description than its blurb. I want to see what my opinion will be of the same book. And often it is just the opposite of that review.

I understand and accept that our readers will have a variety of opinions about our work - that's great! It means our books evoke feelings. If no one notices your work, that's the worst thing for a creative person, not those neutral or negative reviews.

With BR, Misha Quinn

You really have got the bad end of the stick. I recently encountered an author that was not happy with my review. I made sure to lay out what I did and did not like in a constructive way. In the end, I believe the main purpose of a reviewer is to provide information for the potential reader, so they can make a well-informed decision whether they want to make that investment and buy the book.

Sometimes authors make this personal, and see it as an attack on them, instead of just seeing that their book is not going to be for everyone.

I hope something can be worked out. It is a shame that some people cannot take constructive criticism.

It takes a lot of time, efforts and money for an author to put their work out there, so I'm very careful about the words I use in my review. That doesn't mean I don't give 1 or 2 star ratings, but I'll put down my thoughts in a polite way, stating why I didn't like it. At the same time, there will be something I did like since I'm giving it 2 stars, so I'll try to balance the bad with the good. And if I didn't like anything at all, then it's on me because I kept reading it. I should have stopped reading long ago and given a justification to the author as to why I couldn't complete the book. I won't write a review in this case. Negative reviews are equally helpful as the positive ones to a reader, so that they know what they're getting into. An author cannot expect each and every person to like their book. It's not realistic.

I am so sorry you went through this terrifying experience :(

Diane wrote: "I'm relatively new to the reviewing world and I recently gave a bad review and the author (who I will leave anonymous as so not to stoop to his level) made a personal hate campaign against me - try..."

Dear Diane, I'm sorry to read you have to endure such harassment. I too have been harassed by others, even by people I don't and also from my ex and his new victim.

However, in my case it was harassment against me as an author because I wrote 2 books about the mental abuse I went through while living with a psychopath. Within time I simply learned not to react on all their BS anymore. Instead I wrote some articles on my web site of what I had to endure as an author from people who stoop so low that I've no words for their actions.

My advice; keep your proud head high and ignore such mean people. I know it can be very hard, but you actually do yourself a favour by not reacting on it. And I'm sure you're much more clever than those low people and their mean mentality they show against you. Don't give such nasty people that sort of satisfaction to harass you, you're worth much more.

I wish you all the best in the future.

Kind regards
Author M. L. Stark

Diane, I'm sorry that you have experienced this. The person in question is acting in an incredibly dangerous way and if this has continued (I'm late to the game) and you have not already done so, I would strongly suggest that you report him to whatever authorities deal with cyber-bullying. This type of behaviour is not acceptable in any which way or form whether it be from or to an author or another reader or anyone else online, in the bookish space or not.


Hi folks. Longtime GR user here who has only been writing reviews for a few years, but a newbie to the group here. This is my first comment, please excuse the essay😆...

I'm a nobody in the grand scheme of things, but I've had three incidents where I have had authors question my review of their books;
🔸One of these was an author who requested reviews (in another group) and didn't like it when I gave my honest opinion on one of the aspects and didn't comment on all of the positive aspects I pointed out. This happened over private message however so was not an issue.
🔸One was a comment in my review that I responded to with a rebuttal
🔸And the other was another comment in my review disbasing my opinion - but at least that person thanked me for my review anyway.
All this to say that I'm lucky enough not to have been bullied/harassed in these situations, but they still put me on edge for a while.

The thing is that in general, most people (myself included) would say that their reviews are for other readers, and in addition, my reviews are for myself too. I do sometimes hope/wish that authors read them and take some notes of certain criticisms (obvious and inexcusable grammar/editing and major cliches mainly) but I don't feel it is their place to respond directly as they are not the intended audience for reviews. Also, a review is someone's opinion so how can one argue with another person's opinion? It makes zero sense to me... as much as it pains me when people hate on books that I love and vice versa. Or when reviews are nonsense or just a few coarse words/sentences or are cruel beyond what is necessary or full of gifs... but each to their own as some people find value in those🥴.

I have seen a lot of discourse recently on various online platforms about this very issue this year and with some high profile books/authors. I know of one person who actually took her review down after being bullied by the author... only to put it back up again after some stern words from her GR friends thankfully. What is the point of sharing our honest opinions if we get censored for them? How does that help other readers? Or even the author in the long term? And whilst I always try to be polite and respectful when I'm 'ranting', and think much more positively of others who do the same, I'm sure that on a few occasions I've perhaps not been... and that is ok too for me because it shows the extent of my feelings on certain things that are important to me and how bad my reaction was to them.

Reviews are such an incredibly important tool for so many people when choosing what to read and sometimes people even make their choices from negative reviews because we all have different preferences - I have picked up quite a few 📚 that I have really enjoyed from other people's lack of love for them and I know others that have done the same. Negative reviews are not the be-all and end-all, far from it, and in many cases is additional advertising - sometimes people will choose to read a book because of the negative opinions simply from curiosity or to form an opinion themselves and sometimes just in support of the author and I have seen this with both large and smaller titles.

In terms of DNF's, if there is a particular reason (other than just... boredom) I tend to state it. I'm not a big DNFfer in general (I am far too curious for that and often want to know the outcome of a book even if I'm not enjoying it that much) and when I do it is usually something quite egregious that I find offensive or the writing being so poor (and my tolerance for that is quite high compared to many) so as to make it unreadable. In such cases, I feel it is my duty to inform others who may have similar thoughts as I do, especially if I've read a substantial percentage of the book. As soon as I decide not to finish, that is in itself an opinion and may be relevant to share. And I would never seek approval from an author whose book I was reviewing before I posted it because that just does not compute for me, even if the review had been solicited. If that is an unpopular opinion, sorry 🤔 but so be it.

Lastly, as someone who not exclusively, but mostly reads indie romance authors I am aware that negative opinions reflect differently on them, with the double whammy of being the romance genre (different convo different day!) and especially on those with a low number of ratings and reviews. However, I read many indies authors who I find to be far superior in all ways to many that are traditionally published so I don't necessarily treat them differently - because that reflects on many readers' snobbish opinions of indies across genres as a whole.

As much as I understand that choosing the indie route is difficult and more expensive than us non-authors can imagine, many publish work that has had little effort put into it and/or simply do not improve their craft over time and continue to release subpar work year after year. That reflects badly on those that DO do the work with little credit - those who have taken reader critique on board and learnt from it and improved their skills over time or even just started out strong at the outset.

I'm a strong advocate for indie authors, many of which choose that route to have total control and/or overcome the stringent gatekeeping in the mainstream industry. I don't always expect perfection, as I said earlier I have a higher tolerance than many people for issues with writing quality, but I do not want to waste my time (as well as money) on those who just can't be bothered to at least try.

Whew, that was a lot for a first post. Thanks if you read it all and didn't fall asleep 🤣.