Indie Book Club discussion

I'm wondering if anyone here has had any experience with BookRooster that they might want to share. I have a friend using their service now and I am not impressed, as yet.

Definitely not worth it. It might have worked for the first few people who signed up. The reviewers they have (I signed up as one) are, at this point, so buried under a massive pile of review requests that it could be years before they review yours. And, unfortunately, A LOT of the books that come down the pipeline through there are not great.

It's sad, but true -- the real money to be made in the indie publishing revolution is being paid BY indie authors, not TO them.

A couple of points worth considering with it are this, too:

a.) It's a fine line, but most likely paying for reviews through Book Rooster is a violation of Amazon's consumer review guidelines, by the virtue of the author having paid for them, even if they're not good reviews, or seem to be unbiased.

b.) As an indie author, it's very, very, very easy to spend more on the publishing/marketing process than you will EVER make on the book. It's highly unlikely that whatever reviews you'd get through BookRooster, or from some other service, will actually garner you the almost $70 in additional sales. If you're an author who can easily recoup $70 with your sales, you're not an author who needs reviews through BookRooster.

BookRooster... I haven't heard of them. They offer to do reviews for you if you pay them $$$?

I think it'd be easier to find someone to do a review for you if you gift a copy of your book to someone. That's how I started getting reviews. Or ask in clubs like this one. There are always people looking for new material to read and many here would be willing to do a review for a free book. Myself included. :)

Big J

Indeed. My friend ended up getting his money refunded. BookRooster took weeks to notify him that it would take weeks to get his book out. I passed Breeana's feedback on to him and he opted for the refund.

Good deal. More than likely a very wise choice.

Wow. I'd never heard of Book Rooster, but thanks for the info.

I believe that BookRooster is part of Kindle Nation.

I'm considering starting a free site to do the same thing as BookRooster. Any thoughts?

My thoughts are that you will be inundated with 100x as many people requesting reviews as you have reviewers, and that the first ten people will get a few reviews and everyone else will be lucky to get one. :(

Breeana wrote: "... and that the first ten people will get a few reviews and everyone else will be lucky to get one."

So make sure you give us advance warning before you open up for books to review. ;-D

Eric - I'd have to agree with Breeana. Whereas its noble to offer, my guess is you'd be inundated with requests for reviews.

It sounds like such a site would need to primarily cater to the reviewers needs. Hmmm...

Here is a site that already offers that service. The wait can be quite long for a review, but they seem ethical and fair.

http://thekindlebookreview.blogspot.com/

I'm going to have to say that my blog seems similar as well. Submit a review request, I try to respond to all but don't get to them all the time. I am thinking of trying to recruit another reviewer to increase the speed reviews are taken care of at my place since there can be a pretty substantial wait.

That's awesome, Scott. I didn't know you did that on your blog.

Ok on further inspection of bookrooster I don't have a contingent of reviewers (yet). I am actually looking to recruit a few more people to help me get reviews out faster, but as of right now no one I know likes to read. I still managed 130 reviews by myself last year so hopefully I can keep that trend going and hit minimum of 150 this year.

Scott, 130 is impressive! If you take on a couple of junior reviewers, you can take your website to the next level: draw more traffic, share the workload, create some advertising revenue, if that's in your plans.

I signed up on Bookroster about 3 months ago and they have never contacted me to review. I feel as if it would be a waste of an authors money to use its services.

That's pretty much the general consensus about them. You'd be better off to frequent the forums and ask for reviewers and then provide copies for review. That's how I did it. And it did take some time. Three months for my first review, and a month or two later for the next. Luckily, they started coming in after that. Most good, some bad. All you can do is accept all critique and never ever get angry over a bad review. Thank them for their time and move on.

Been there, done that! :)

That sucks! I just signed up. I wish I'd read this earlier!

Yeah, it can be hard to get an honest unbiased review for your book. It takes time. And unfortunately you open yourself up for the chance to get harsh reviews, too.

The best piece of advice is to visit forums like these and ask if anyone would be interested in reviewing your novel. Write a blurb. Mention what genre, # of words, target audience, etc.

I'm trying to think... I'm pretty sure I made a topic here for people seeking reviews. Let me find it. I'll post something in it so it is bumped back to the top.

Big J

Well with the people who are helping me review for my blog I can now claim a possible of 5 reviewers posting reviews on three sites at least plus a blog feature. So if a submission appeals to my cohorts it could see 15 or more reviews spread over the various review sites.

Hi - I know this is an old thread and have taken the advice to steer clear of BR but has anybody tried ebookreviewer123? (www.ebookreviewer123.com. Just want to know your thoughts before I commit.

Daniel wrote: "Hi - I know this is an old thread and have taken the advice to steer clear of BR but has anybody tried ebookreviewer123? (www.ebookreviewer123.com. Just want to know your thoughts before I commit."

I would stay far far away from any service that charges for reviews, *especially* ones like ebookreviewer123 that imply (though they don't actually come right out and say it) that the paid reviews will be positive. It just has that feel of dishonest review practices that have tainted the indie-author community, and is most likely a violation of Amazon's review TOS.

My advice is to join Goodreads groups that coordinate read-and-reviews and offer up free copies of your books to people interested in reading them. The success rate with that is so-so; I've had about a 50% return rate of reviews for review copies I've given out. But at least they're honest reviews and didn't cost me anything but the ebook file. I also participate in giveaways and have gotten a review or two from that.

The other place I'd go for reviews is Story Cartel. Post your book, get 50 downloads and 3 or more reviews.

And then the challenge can be once you've gotten people to ask for your book, getting them to actually post a review. I signed up about eight beta readers, but so far only two of them have posted a review.

It's definitely a waiting game.

Thanks very much for all this review advice -- a new challenge for me, even though Cally's Way is my third novel published by a small press!

I published my first novel last fall. In an effort to "prime the pump" in terms of book reviews, I thought I'd give Book Rooster a try. Bad decision. After a month of radio silence, I contacted them to see what was up. I received a brief placation from them via email assuring me they were working to get my book reviewed. Another month went by so I emailed them again ... no response. A week later emailed them again ... and again no response.

Finally, in my frustration, I contacted PayPal to make a vendor complaint. My message to PayPal is below. True, it was only $67, but thievery is still thievery -- made even worse by taking advantage of poor struggling writers :-(


--- MY LETTER TO PAYPAL ---

Dear PayPal,

I am writing to complain about a commercial transaction made using your payment service.

I wish to report the vendor for possible fraud (or at the very least, deceptive and unethical business practices).

On November 17, 2014 I made a payment to Catherine McDonald in the amount of $67.00. This was for a book review service called Book Rooster. For the fee, Book Rooster promises to deliver at least three to ten book reviews by unbiased competent reviewers.

It has been over two months since I made the payment and I have yet to receive a single review. Furthermore, bookrooster.com customer service will no longer respond to my email.

As a result of my frustration over the lack of response, I did some digging into bookrooster.com and discovered that my experience is not uncommon. It seems Book Rooster has a track record for not delivering on the services they advertise.

Here are some links to threads I found, discussing the problems with the Book Rooster review service

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

http://www.kboards.com/index.php?topi...

https://hudowen.wordpress.com/2012/09...

I regret that I did not do this homework beforehand.

Since Book Rooster has yet to deliver one review on my book's behalf, I am submitting this complaint for your investigation, just as I would with any other vendor who fails to deliver a purchased product or service.

Sincerely,

Steven Ackley
San Jose, CA

I'm instinctively wary of paying for such services (and don't have a lot of spare cash for it in any case).

Best of luck getting your money back, and if anyone here has similar issues do feel free to flag them up so that club members can be warned of potential risks.

I sent Book Rooster info and money as requested. After two weeks I received no answer to my messages or emails. In the months since paying the money, approximately $62.00, I have seen not one review, not one comment, not one answering email. From my point of view it's a complete scam. - Leon Kastel

Sorry to hear that, Leon. At least threads like this one will hopefully reduce the number of people losing out.

I am in solidarity with everyone else in this string that has been duped by 'Book Rooster'
They are a sham and should be taken down by the better business bureau and/or the department of consumer affairs. My only saving grace is that it was only 67 dollars they STOLE from me and not more.

After reading your post this morning, William, I went and checked their website. It looks like their account has been suspended. Hopefully, some agency is taking action against them. It may be only $67 to each of us, but I'm sure when you add it up it easily amounts to grand larceny.