I’ll preface this post by saying that I should be working on my novel right now, but I have a cold and my brain feels like soup. I’m getting to the point of the manuscript where I have to start thinking about tying things up; focusing on the emotional journey of the characters and tweaking things to make it feel satisfying. Basically I’m thinking about Themes with a capital T. I love this bit; but it requires a level of brainpower that is not accessible to me today, so hi Substack, you’re getting a particularly unedited fever-ish version of me today.
I’ve been thinking about negative book reviews1 and the rise of being a hater. Haters everywhere rejoiced at Kendrick Lamar’s super bowl performance a couple of weeks ago; that shit eating grin he flashes to camera while he’s talking about Drake. I’m a fan of Kendrick Lamar, and a big fan of being a hater in general, but since I became a published author, I’ve moved my hating into my private life. Basically, I learned what it felt like to see a negative review of a creative project you poured your heart and soul into, and reader, it does not feel good.
I’m very pro literary-criticism, but there isn’t a lot of that going around these days, especially not on platforms like Goodreads and Substack. In these places, it’s become trendy to write long gif-ridden takedowns of novels you didn’t enjoy, the crueller the better. These takedowns are generating thousands of likes and clicks, and the comments are often full of gleeful praise for the poster being brave enough to tell the ‘truth’ about something. It’s just fun to see someone being mean, right? Especially if they’re being mean about something popular which you think deserves to be brought down a peg or two. The popularity of the novel is often directly related to the level of slagging-off it gets, and I understand why. When you hate something that everyone else loves, it’s hard to keep your opinion to yourself. Buuuuuut, this rise in popularity of negative reviews has trickled down to smaller, less successful novels2. Slagging off a Sunday Times bestseller is different from slamming a debut or something written by an unknown writer; they’re much more likely to see it, for starters.
A lot of these reviews seem to say relatively little about the novel itself, and a whole lot of stuff about the reviewer themselves; specific reasons why they disagreed with the choices the author made and alternate suggestions for how the book could be made better. It’s all pretty shallow and bad faith. In my opinion, a novel is not a monologue; it’s a dialogue. It demands things from the reader; engagement, good faith, curiosity. It’s why reading is so life-changing and also, occasionally, challenging. We cannot be passive consumers when we read novels. We have to engage with the text. Often, when I read negative reviews of novels, I am bowled over by how obvious it is that the reviewer went into the reading process with pre-existing opinions. They were itching to hate it, and hate it they did.
Also, BY THE WAY posting a long rant full of nit-picks about how you hated something is not the same thing as crafting an interesting piece of critique. When I teach non-fiction writing workshops and we start focusing on literary journalism and reviewing, I always try and reiterate this point: Snarkiness is not a substitute for good writing.
Of course, sometimes we just hate things. I have read many novels I hated; sent so many snarky Whatsapp rants to my friends eviscerating different texts. BUT, I do think we should be weighing the pros and cons of sharing these opinions publicly. Maybe the author will read your unkind words and feel badly about it. Maybe you are not the intended audience for this kind of work. Maybe the book sucks, but the author is at the beginning of their career and could do without your paragraphs of ire. Maybe sometimes we should take a minute to pause and think; do I really have to share my thoughts on everything?
I don’t have an answer to this question, and I’m aware that this whole post reads as quite petty and personal. And it is! I’m an author, I know firsthand how to feels to read a long snarky review about my work written by someone who just wants online engagement. It’s impossible to erase myself and my own work from this conversation.
BUT, and this is a big but; I will continue to defend the right for literary critique to exist. Like with everything I write about on here, I don’t have a static opinion or a clear cut solution. I don’t think negative reviews should be done away with altogether. With papers becoming less and less relevant and literary journals shutting down every day, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find well-written, thoughtful, nuanced critiques of art, and I hate that!! I also maintain that being read deeply and critiqued thoughtfully is an unbelievable privilege. If the reviewer engages with my work and takes my writing in good faith, even if there are negative aspects to their review, that’s cool with me. Good literary criticism critiques something without tearing apart.
Personally, I’ve had to stop reading my reviews, both good and bad. The joy of connecting with readers was being outweighed by the sad feeling that would follow me around for the rest of the day when I read a cruel one. Goodreads is a platform for readers, not authors, and you should be allowed to say whatever you want there without worrying about hurting my feelings. It’s not really my business. I believe (I have to believe) that if people knew I was reading their negative reviews of my work, they would be less harsh and personal in their critiques. I understand the thrill that comes from slagging something off and having other people agree with you. I also understand that the flames of hate burn hotter than the flames of love; negative reviews generate more engagement and controversy, and there’s an undeniable thrill that comes with reading hate that just isn’t there with positive reviews.
On the other hand, I’m also pretty sick of blanket positive reviews. Publishers send book content creators free novels in exchange for reviews, and it’s no surprise that these reviews tend to skew on the uber-positive side. These content creators wanna stay on that PR list, right? They don’t want to stop getting free stuff because they’ve developed a reputation of being a harsh critic. I totally get that, but these reviews still drive me a little insane. They’re usually more plot summary than review and tell me absolutely nothing about voice or style or personal preference, nothing that lets me know if I would actually want to read it or not. But I’ll stop here…. before I start hating.
This post is all over the place; I dance from topic to topic and never really land on a solution…… but that’s what having a conversation with me is like, lol. And, as mentioned above, I have a cold. See ya!
Not specifically my own negative reviews but obviously that comes into it.
Like mine, lol.