Bloggers and Reviewers! Has An Author Ever Been Rude to You After You Gave Their Book A Negative Review? Share!

[Stacy-Deanne]

Hi All,

I think it would be very interesting if you guys could share some of the not-so-grateful reactions you've gotten from authors who you've given a bad review for. It makes me laugh to see how foolish some fellow authors act when they get a negative review. We all have our share but some take it more personal and choose to go after the reviewer or blogger. So, have any of you experienced the wrath of a burned author you reviewed? How did this make you feel? Please share.

http://www.stacy-deanne.net

[pussreboots]

Rude... no. Snarky, yes.

[Mark Engebretson]

As a newspaper writer, I occasionally get comments that are less than flattering from readers. As an author, fortunately, I have always gotten very positive feedback, but I am realist enough to know that not everyone will like my novels ... it goes with the territory. That's fine. Anyone who uses their talents to produce something for public consumption - art, music, writing, etc. - has to understand up front that there will be those who don't like what they do. Consequently, if they can't stand the heat the need to stay in the air conditioned dining room.

[Linda]

Umm - can you say harrassing? I wrote an honest review of a Christian book for teens and agree with most of the Christian doctrines in the book. My review stated that the dialog was not correct for the age group, and that because of specific doctrines would be limited in its audience. The author wrote two comments on my blog attacking me personally and as a Christian, which I removed. He didn't attack my review - but me! Later he sent me two emails, in both claiming to apologize, but then attacked me again. I have removed my review just to shut him up and asked him not to contact me again, but now I feel dishonest by not posting my review.

[pussreboots]

Repost the review and block his email and IP. Or if you don't want that publicity to your blog, post them in a more public place like GoodReads or LibraryThing or similar.

[Caitlin Martin]

Yikes. It's amazing to me the behaviors exhibited by some people who call themselves Christian.

You should keep your review up & block his email & IP. I can understand why you wouldn't want to keep hearing from him, but at the same time I wouldn't want to reward his bad behavior by removing the review.

Also, I urge everyone to be sure they're maintaining some level of personal privacy on the Internet. You never know who's out there & you don't want to be easy to find.

[Emily Veinglory]

It happens very rarely, but I have had two authors send pretty crude insults by email.

[Sandy Lender]

I had an experience a couple years ago. I bought a friend's book and gave it a five-star review because I enjoyed the storyline and a couple of the characters. But in the review, I included the caveat that the book was not well edited or proofread. (I don't think I mentioned this in the review, but each and every page had at least one grammatical and/or typographical error, but usually more. It was shameful.) As an editor, I felt it would have been disingenuous of me not to mention that the book was riddled with errors. I emphasized in the rest of the review that the story was fabulous. It moved like lightning--kept the reader tearing through the pages, etc. But my friend went ballistic, calling me out in an online group as a terrible person who was destroying her chances at ever selling another copy of the book. It was very embarrassing.
Author Sandy Lender
"Some days, I just want the dragon to win."