Here's my attitude and advice about negative comment about my books.

Check out,




Scroll down to the community reviews and filter on the "1 star," reviews.

There are 3161 of them today.

Stephen King has sixteen times more 1 star ratings on one book than I have total ratings for all my books.

Here's the bottom line, negative comment, snarky comment, etc, indicates that my book is reaching more people.

If my marketing is successful, I will attract one star reviews. The fact I don't have 1 star reviews is not an indication that my books are marvelous (and I love my books and I love the stories I tell, but I'd be kidding myself if I thought that they were for everyone), but that my marketing is not reaching enough people.

When my marketing is successful, I'll start getting 1 star reviews.

I'd love to have 1000 one star ratings at 1% of my total ratings. Let's add in 4000 two star ratings at 4%, for a total set of critical reviews of 5% (like the Salem's Lot profile) for 100,000 ratings.

If I have 100,000 ratings for A Subtle Agency, I've sold 10,000,000 books. I've paid the mortgage. I've retired from the day job, and I'm writing full time, and producing three books a year instead of one.

The day I get my first genuine 1 star review, I'm breaking open a bottle of champagne as my marketing is beginning to reach enough people to find those inspired to criticize my books.

Today is a good day to get a 1 star review.

(H/t to Klingon philosophy...)