How many reviewers would review a self published book?

[Allan Russell]

I'm wondering because self publishing is an option I have just begun to explore.

Self publishing raises questions because there is so much self published rubbish out there. Yet plenty of great material has been self published. Wordsworth and Coleridge did it, Virginia Woolf did it and recently three books shortlisted in the Man Booker prize were self-published.

Also just because something has been vetted by Agents and Professional Publishers there is no guarantee that it is not garbage.

So what do you think, would you review a self published book?

[Enbrethiliel]

+JMJ+

I'm glad that this thread became active again because I've actually agreed to review one self-published novel and didn't think to ask for an excerpt before I said yes.

So, yeah, there are quite a few typesetting problems (no big deal), and I think it's pretty obvious that this book didn't make it through the usual gauntlet of agents and editors (a very big deal). And that has made me wonder whether I should review it with the same standards. I don't want to give it a special break just because it was self-published, but the irreverent tone I use in my critical reviews is partly a reaction to the full marketing push lots of books get--which this one didn't get at all.

It's not so much a case of, "This book wasn't picked up by an agent/publisher because it was so rough," as it is a case of, "This book is so rough because it wasn't picked up by an agent/publisher."

(As an aside, I know that the RITA Awards honour both the author and the editor of particular books. Having read one self-published novel and done some freelance work as an editor, I can totally see why!)