Sci-Fi, fantasy and speculative Indie Authors Review discussion
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Does Goodreads Hide Reviews?
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Having done system support in a past work incarnation, it sounds like more of a glitch in the ghostware (i.e.: the concatenation of cumulative systems tweaks and upgrades that intermittently causes a problem, that programmers can't locate even after hours of pounding forehead to keyboard).Make a note of the problem and when you noticed it. If it happens repeatedly, report it to support.
Do you mean this one? https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
If so, it shows up when I check your book. It's strange that you don't see it. Sometimes it takes a while before it shows but I don't think I ever had to wait over a week.
I couldn't find it either, but that link works.
That is so odd! I wasn't to find the review on the book's page either, but the link G.G. posted does indeed work. I too like to keep careful track of when reviews are posted on my books or even when people just add them to TBR lists, and sometimes the number will increase but there's nobody new on the list. I know the Goodreads system in general sometimes takes awhile to update things, but it's usually only a matter of waiting a couple of hours. I think in one case, it took a couple of days. This definitely sounds like more of a glitch than anything. You might try asking one of the librarians...?
Mod
Also interesting is that under the review is a little note to me that says the following:
Ok, you got a bad review. Deep breath. It happens to every author eventually. Keep in mind that one negative review will not impact your book’s sales. In fact, studies have shown that negative reviews can actually help book sales, as they legitimize the positive reviews on your book’s page.
We really, really (really!) don’t think you should comment on this review, even to thank the reviewer. If you think this review is against our Review Guidelines, please flag it to bring it to our attention. Keep in mind that if this is a review of the book, even one including factual errors, we generally will not remove it.
For more on how to interact with readers, please see our Author Guidelines.
If you still feel you must leave a comment, click “Accept and Continue” below to proceed (but again, we don’t recommend it).
Accept and Continue
Since this is my first 'negative review' I don't know if that is always there or not. I would find that suspicious were it not for the fact that others can't see it either. From what I can see of the GR guidelines, this would only happen if a review is flagged. I really hope it wasn't because regardless of who flagged it and for what reason, that won't look good on me.
Christina,Interesting. I had a 2-Star rating on "Capturing Shadows" though w/o review, never saw anything like that.
I guess the GR staff thinks it's okay if some readers behave badly (by collectively low-rate / bad review targets), but not authors?
Kind of makes you wonder who flagged it, though as far as it reflecting on you it probably won't, or shouldn't.
Mod
Yeah, it would be nice to think GR trusts us enough to act like mature adults, but as you remarked some authors haven't. Then there are the readers who get away with asinine things they shouldn't. Perhaps one day, after the zombiepocalypse, things will be done differently.About the only bad reaction I'll have is if I let someone talk me into submitting to a Trad house again, a reaction not to a rejection letter but to my doing something I know is pointless even though I'm a decent wordsmith.
Have a PBR and kick back.
Hi Christina,I have had a two star review, and yes, I did get that message. __(virtual group hug)__ If you filter your added list by 2 stars, you'll find the reviewer, Grrr
Not every one is going to love your work. It's not your fault if they're too dumb to get it. ;)
Mod
As for any perceived double standard as to readers vs authors, we do need to keep in mind that Goodreads is a reader community first. We *should* be on our best behavior. Whether readers are or not is not up to us to police.
I did once have a 2-star review (last year), but it has disappeared, and I never got a message like that. All of my other reviews have been 3 or higher (just lucky, I guess).
Christina,I do understand GR is a reader community first, but while I'm an author I'm also a reader.
Whether I'm viewed as an author or a reader, I try to show others what I was taught is considered to be common courtesy. This is why I make every effort to not violate Wheaton's Law, unless someone keeps on my six like there's no tomorrow.
Some authors react to a less than stellar review like my tiny demon reacts to an offer of asparagus, and they should be ashamed of themselves, seriously. If a reader doesn't like my work, I don't care because other readers do like what I write -- it all balances out in the long-run.
Some readers will take out their particular hangups on certain authors, whether organizing their friends to low-ball same while making disparaging reviews, or by resorting to other childish tactics and activities. This hasn't happened to me personally, but if it did I'd do what I normally do, I'd ignore it for the most part.
It doesn't matter if we're seen as readers, writers, or reader-writers, it's up to each of us to be on our best behavior. Unfortunately some people have the mistaken impression the internet makes them anonymous. Since I'm in Texas, I'll stick with courtesy as best practice.
As for policing, I'm too old, broken, and judged unfit for duty to police anything but myself, while I hopefully guide tiny demon warrior princess for as long as she requires my assist.
Christina wrote: "Hey folks, I need to know whether I'm paranoid and there's a glitch or if this is some sort of new practice that has been put into place due to some authors who react badly. I noticed a while ago..."
I've been wanting to ask about this. Since we released our latest book in late Feb, I've been tracking ratings here on GR, and I've been seeing ratings show up, disappear and then come back after a couple of days (or so). I recall Richard saying this happened to him, also.
With us, it's be good and bad ratings: for example, one day we got three 4 and 5 star ratings, then they went away the next day. A few days later, they were back. (That was the biggest batch that ever disappeared and reappeared.) This has been happening regularly. I've been wondering what's up.
Christina wrote: "Okay, well this is interesting. G.G. is friends with the reviewer (and I was right, it's the same one as was posted on Amazon), so I went to my own shelf to see if there was a way to make my review..."When I was new here, we got a 2-star review (not just a rating) as a result of our only giveaway. Now I feel (still) the review is a bit misguided, but it was thoughtful and informative, it did say nice things and it was (is) useful for letting people who share the reviewer's outlook (and there are quite) just what was in the book, so they didn't waste time or money on it.
So, in toto, the review was a positive thing. I went to thank the reviewer for writing it, 1) because she put decent effort into it and it is helpful, and 2) took ensure that she knew that even though she got this book at our expense, we harbored no hard feelings because she didn't like it and said so.
So imagine my shock when I got just that message you saw! I recall having to click thru a couple of screen (best practices, read this etc) to send my thank-you note.
So yes, apparently GR believes that authors in general are immature and lack self-control. I actually considered leaving GR over it because it meant that either GR assumed this about me, without a shred of evidence (in which case I wanted nothing to do with GR), or GR was actually correct in their assessment (in which case I wanted nothing to do with the people here).
I have been glad to discover that GR is wrong in its assessment of the authors here.
PS: I have never seen that message on a negative rating, only that review, and that is the only negative review we have gotten. If I tried to contact a person who left a negative rating, I would guess I'd get the same warning, but I have never done that.
I got a 2 star review on one of my shorts after someone had read 30% of it, which seemed unfair. Oh well, life goes on.
From experience, I think GR might only warn the author to be careful what they reply when it's a negative review from a stranger. I received a negative review (1*) from someone on my friend list and I never received that message. (He removed the rating since then and explained why, but I had nothing to do with his decision.) Maybe it's because they assumed I wouldn't be rude to a friend? Who knows. It's still sad that they feel the need to warn authors. :/
G.G. wrote: "From experience, I think GR might only warn the author to be careful what they reply when it's a negative review from a stranger. I received a negative review (1*) from someone on my friend list an..."I guess that would make sense? They might well assume that if you have someone as listed a friend, you've obviously had some degree of positive interaction, and they dispense with the warning.
But I notice Amazon doesn't do this. If an author leaves a comment on a negative review (which I have done twice), there is no warning. If you act like a jerk, you get reported and Amazon then takes action as they see fit. So I'm unclear why GR feels the need to do it.
Owen wrote: "But I notice Amazon doesn't do this. If an author leaves a comment on a negative review (which I have done twice), there is no warning. If you act like a jerk, you get reported and Amazon then takes action as they see fit. So I'm unclear why GR feels the need to do it. "It may go back to the differing roots of Amazon and GR; one started as a business and the other as a spot for social interaction of readers.
My guess is as GR evolved to include authors, and then became more commercial (as so many social sites have commercialized), it also began to attract a more diverse crowd with readers who needed to be protected from bad authors. In this case my guess is the 10 to 15 year-old crowd, but maybe not as there are any number of immature adults (readers and authors alike).
Since I don't do reviews as a rule I don't know, but if there is a similar warning for the reader who leaves a low-rating and review it would make more sense. Somehow I doubt this happens, but it would be nice if it did.
Bottom line is some people feel the need to protect other people from themselves regardless of the actual situation. Every time I see the leech I get a bout of questions meant to determine whether I'm suicidal or homicidal, whether the visit is about an eye, finger, or flatulence -- we are living in a nanny-run society whether we need it or not. That warning is just an extension.
I've had 5-star reviews that did not appear unless I went through every single rating and clicked on them to ferret out who left it. I agree with R.F.G.: it has to be a coding issue and nothing more.
Of course I've had people "comment" on my book and explain their 4-star rating, but they never actually rate it. So I have these comments that never become reviews because they simply forgot to disposition them as read.
Mod
What might make more sense would be a check box that asks the reviewer if they want to allow comments from the author on applicable reviews.
Christina wrote: "What might make more sense would be a check box that asks the reviewer if they want to allow comments from the author on applicable reviews..."That would be a neat idea!
I believe freedom of speech requires right to reply. They should only block abuse.
Anthony wrote: "I believe freedom of speech requires right to reply. They should only block abuse."
Freedom of speech as guaranteed by the US Constitution applies only to restrictions by government. A privately-owned website can restrict it.
Freedom of speech as guaranteed by the US Constitution applies only to restrictions by government. A privately-owned website can restrict it.
Mod
What I am suggesting is to put the level of interaction into the hands of the reviewer. Some readers are happy to engage with authors and some wish not to know anything about us. We are the public figures, not the readers. Yes, this is a public website and anyone who uses it should realize that, but you and I both know not everyone understands this.
I bet people have gotten death threats over bad reviews on Goodreads. Just saying.They want readers to feel free to express themselves about the author's work, and the judge doesn't need the defendant intimidating the jury.
I take no personal offense too it. I know that is probably there because one or more people crossed some lines that they shouldn't have before I got here.
Christina wrote: "What Ken said. If Goodreads wants to delete this whole thread, they don't even have to give us a reason. What I am suggesting is to put the level of interaction into the hands of the reviewer. So..."
I actually agree that would be a better idea. And quite right, freedom of speech does not apply to private communication (which is why GR and other sites have a block button) or this thread. We have no "right" to sound off here.
As an aside, regarding a 2-star warning, I find it mildly interesting that Amazon considers a 3-star review "negative" and GR doesn't.
Fascinating discussion here. I'm happy to have been able to see it. Personally, I don't see the point of restrictions on authors responding to comments. I understand that experienced authors advise us not to, and I generally follow that advice. Snarking about review will make me look like an idiot, and people don't generally want to read books by idiots. I get few enough reviews that I can have a really bad day in reaction to a single review, but conversely I can spend a day with my tail wagging after a good one. I have no desire to write a book everybody loves (I can't even imagine what that would be like), and in fact some of my favourite books have been absolutely hated by some people. So, rough, smooth, it's all good. Software dudes and policy setters at GR perhaps need to review all their rules, see if some of them are a bit daft?
I think the best thing you can do for a bad review is thank them and move on.
Mod
They want readers to feel free to express themselves about the author's work, and the judge doesn't need the de..."
Not just death threats. There was a reviewer who was physically attacked by an unhinged author. Then there was the author who famously wrote an article blatantly admitting to stalking a reviewer under the defense that the reviewer 'catfished' her, which they did not.
Unfortunately, yes, this reflects on all of us. What can we do? Be an example and NOT act insanely.
WOW LOLThere's a short story to write in there.
All I can do is control my own actions.
Richard wrote: "Software dudes and policy setters at GR perhaps need to review all their rules, see if some of them are a bit daft?"I wish they would. That is one of the beefs I have with social media: the "god complex". There is a great feeling of power in controlling people's social interactions (a few people who run social media sites have gone on about this in the most blatant terms). That feeling of power takes hold and the desire to play god becomes irresistible (especially because many of the people who are drawn to working in social media are drawn to it for just that reason). I think most authors can understand wanting to play god -- it's what we do. But we don't do it (as a rule) to real people.
'play god... but not with real people.' That's a nice way to put it. Many of the definitions of insanity apply to authors quite nicely. We just need to be clear that it's a fictional world.
Richard wrote: "Many of the definitions of insanity apply to authors quite nicely. We just need to be clear that it's a fictional world."So true. I try to keep my insanity under the covers (of a book that is).
Mod
Mod
All I'm saying is that complaining about poor behavior here and saying the readers who give low ratings to our works are too dumb to get it is not presenting us in a good light either.
This is an arguably off-topic, and purely informational, question about "losing" reviews on GR (so if this is it's own thing, it can be moved to a more appropriate place). The question is: have people here seen a decline in the frequency of reviews as relative to just ratings here on GR over the last 2 years?
Our first book got 17 reviews. Since then, we've gotten only 5 reviews, and 3 of those are by people who reviewed the first book. So we've only gotten 2 new people reviewing a book since the second one was released. I'm curious if others have seen a similar trend.
Just to be clear, I have no interest (whatsoever) in attempting to attract more reviews. That isn't why I'm asking at all. I'm just curious if others might have noted a shift in the GR community in the last two year, in this respect.
And to be perfectly clear, we have nothing against reviews. We use reviews in a particular way and any attempts by us to attract additional reviews would interfere with our interest there.
Mod
I did notice a couple of ratings disappear lately. No idea where they went. One was a friend rating and I've yet to work up the courage to ask if she deleted it on purpose.
Christina wrote: "Are the books with less reviews next in series? I've noticed that I'll get reviews on the first in series that will mention that they read the rest. I think some people just have the idea that they..."They are. I do think that has something to do with it. But we haven't seen the same behavior to the same degree on Amazon. Yes, the reviews of later books have gone down (and obviously they haven't been out as long, so I'm trying to do some normalization), but not anything like they have on GR. (We have 66 reviews in Amazon, all told.)
I just saw a rating or two go away and come back this PM. We got a batch of ratings today and I fully expect them to not show up tomorrow.
Problems with the great big database in the sky causing reviews that appear and disappear are probably the result of nothing more than business as usual. Nothing personal.From time to time I find that I have to rattle my kindle app to get it to show all the books I have purchased or collected. It always shows numerically how many books I have but doesn't always show all the book cover thumbnails.
The old time definitions of things are changing. If you agree that they should be changed than you have to agree to accept the consequences of those changes.
Anyone in the world can publish a book now. Not just write one, but publish it and distribute it. And have as many copies as needed available. The old time definition implied that you needed to have physical books in a physical location to sell your books. And when you ran out of physical books you needed to get more physical books printed. Now the only restriction left is whether you want to write it or not.
Anyone in the world can write a review now and have that review published. There are no requirements for writing a review, you don't even need to read the book to give it a review.
Put those two new definitions together and sometimes there will be situations where the the information is useless. It is up to the owners of the website to sort things out. It's their website not yours. Sometimes that can take a long time. There are no priorities for resolving problems in this world that cause damage because it takes a long time to determine what the damage is, if it ever even existed.
You can take this exact conversation and reverse the words and you will find it in other groups. This is because both sides are wrong. Look up any subject on the web and you will find all kinds of interpretations of the facts. Some of them are diametrically opposed. Usually this means one set of "facts" is wrong but sometimes both statements are true because they are part of a larger picture that is not shown. When there is fictitious information people rarely try to get the situation fixed because it doesn't relate to what they are doing. It is some one else's problem. When it isn't related to you and you don't need to see it fixed then when something that does relate to you needs to be fixed there is still no reason why it should be fixed. Nothing personal, that just how it works. That's how real problems don't get fixed in the real world.
Authors probably shouldn't write reviews of their own books. That's what the blurb is for, which can say whatever you want it to say.
Authors probably shouldn't respond to reviews of their own books. But they can respond to reviews of other people's books.
The force of the web is not contained within one person, which is why it is so difficult to respond to a situation through a single person.
Mod
Christina,I think the answer to your question is "yes". Being the nosy one I can be, I tried to go out and look. Even using the link provided by G.G. all I could find was the rating.
I dug around to find the book, and as all of the reviews from the group here, but it still didn't show up. Reset the filters 2 or 3 times, and it still didn't pop up. Now, I'm really wondering what's going on.
K. wrote: "Christina,I think the answer to your question is "yes". Being the nosy one I can be, I tried to go out and look. Even using the link provided by G.G. all I could find was the rating.
I dug aro..."
Just more data: That is odd. I checked the link G.G. twice (yesterday and today) and saw the review both times. But it is weird that the review does not appear on the book's page for me, and while rating detail lists one 2-star review/rating, clicking on the 2-star filter returns nothing, even though the list says there is a review there.
That is a behavior I have not noted yet, elsewhere.
Charles wrote: "I think the best thing you can do for a bad review is thank them and move on."There is a line that critics cross where they are reveling in the negative. But I appreciate a well thought out review even if it's negative. At least the person took the time to read what I wrote. Being ignored is the worst fate to a writer.
I noticed a while ago that I had a new review (yes, I have so few that I notice when the number goes up by one) and went to see which book it was. Typically, reviews won't show up right away for me, but I'll see a change in the rank and number of reviews for a book. As it turned out, it was a two star on Going Green.
At the same time, a two star review went up on Amazon, so using my keen deductive reasoning skills, I can safely assume the GR review is probably the same, however, it seems I'll never know. More than a week later, it still shows that I have six reviews, but only five appear on the product page.
If it was the same review as the Amazon one, there was nothing terribly offensive about it, so I can't imagine it getting flagged. If Goodreads is simply hiding negative reviews from authors as some sort of misguided safety precaution, then I have an objection. I've long lamented that my only reviews are positive and those who don't like my books only give them a star rating without explanation. Negative feedback can be constructive and incredibly helpful at times!
So my question is: has this happened to you? Are there reviews for your books that seem to have vanished into the ether, yet show proof of existence in the number of reviews and average rank? Or do you think there is a glitch by which the review just got stuck in the system somewhere?