One of my biggest pet peeves when looking through reviews of books I’m interested in.. is to see reviews with 1 star remarks that contain some of the following phrases:
- I didn’t read this book, but I dislike how I cannot get it for <insert e-reader here> (and no, it isn’t just an Amazon Kindle thing – I see it regarding the Nook, Sony E-Readers and other lesser known readers).
- My copy of this book was damaged horribly, the seller said it was in great shape!
- This Audio of the Book is illegitimate!!
Seeing reviews containing those phrases make me so angry and ranks high on my level of pet peeves.
Today, Paul Carr from TechCrunch wrote an article calling for change with regards to Amazon’s Book Review policy. While I don’t agree with his full article (you should not have to purchase from a site to review it) he makes a valid point.
If you have an issue with the method of distribution there should be a way of indicating your disapproval without marking the book as 1 star or leaving a negative review of the book itself. Author Laura Anne Gilman was speaking about this today on Twitter and mentioned that “most publishers have a “contact us” e-mail. Comments ARE read.“. While I appreciate hearing this from an author, it still does not give a way to publicly express our disapproval. If we don’t like a book for valid reasons, we let people know. If we want to be able to read a book on our electronic device, we should be able to let people know this too. Sure – we can hit the links requesting it from the publisher, but it often just…disappears into cyber-space and we are left not hearing anything for months at a time (I’ve yet to see a book I’ve requested in e-format be approved, and yes.. I keep track).
I won’t get into the whole Amazon vs. the world of publishing arguments. There’s enough blogs and articles talking about such. I will say though as an avid book lover, a reader, a consumer who purchases books as well as supports her library, it frustrates me to no end not to have a book made available to me via my Kindle. I want to read and rate books and unless you can get the airlines to drop their fees for luggage so I can bring a hard copy along or start making ultra-thin books so I can easily carry them in my purse.. that just won’t happen with many of the books I’d love to read.
What do you think? Is there a solution to this that will not punish both Authors and Readers, or either of them?
Perhaps there should be a “Book Availability Review” right along side the Book Review. On the other hand, I’m all for airlines dropping luggage fees instead of dropping luggage!
@Auntie The Book Availability Review is an option I was thinking of – but don’t know how feasible it would be (and people would probably still rate the wrong thing!)
I totally agree. Someone at Amazon should be deleting reviews that have nothing to do with the story itself. It lowers the overall ratings and someone who just looks at the overall stars might pass on an otherwise terrific book. BRAVO for posting this RANT!
@Diane There are SO MANY though – I can’t even imagine going through every book. Such a messed up situation!
Equally annoyed are book sellers who get low ratings because the buyer didn’t like the book when they read it! A seller can request to have those kind of ratings removed; surely a book review that’s really about customer service can be taken down as well.