Bad Reviews--keep 'em to yourselves please
Preface: I wrote this in respone to a post on another site from a woman who'd sent her client a copy of a bad review of their work with the (to me, misdirected) idea that somehow the writer would be able to use the comments to advantage, gain some insight from it. Someone else in the group felt this deserved further blogging...and so, it's your turn. --GF
While it may be possible to use a bad review to advantage, personally I never want to see one. If you love my book, please tell me, please gush, please worship and heap praise with a shovel. If you hate it, please contact the aliens and be taken up to the Mother Ship immediately. That constructivist approach reminds me too much of the actor who said when he wanted to mess up another actor's performance in a play, he would describe to that actor all the wonderful things the actor was doing. The result was, his victim became so self-conscious of all his turns and phrasings that it ruined every performance after that. (This is akin to George Lucas believing after 3 Star Wars movies that he'd been inspired all along by Joseph Campbell because a reviewer claimed he must have been, with the result that, armed with that faux knowledge, he made 6 more films that were so wretched, many of us wanted our money back before the end of the Main Titles.
I prefer to keep a filter between me and the reviewers, someone who looks at the reviews and then tells me "you can see this one", but keeps the others away from me. This is, I've found, not uncommon among writers and artists. Spouses or friends or agents will act as a kind of shield. My experience with bad reviews is that I take them personally, probably more so than I should, more so than is healthy. And I've watched other writers melt down over bad reviews. I've seen 'em scream and rant and rave. I've seen them vengefully put particularly noxious critics into their books as (not making this up) the parasitic creatures who live inside the anus of dragons, sucking off the dragon's shit. I've also seen reviewers go after writers just for the hell of it, because they have an axe to grind, or they have taken it upon their little inflated selves to determine that it's time for this author to be brought down a peg because, oh, the author's had a string of too many damned successes; the critic is tired of hearing how wonderful the author is; the critic thinks he's Rufus Griswold reincarnated, etc., so shoving them up a dragon's butt does not seem unjust to me.
Whatever the case, to me, once the book or story is written and turned in, and I'm happy with it, I much prefer to stay happy with it. And it's not as if it can be called back post- publication and "fixed". So there's not much can be done in response to sharp criticism but get depressed and drink, become a drug addict and eventually die in dementia while roaming the streets of Baltimore.
I think at some level we all believe we're geniuses and our craft will prove this to the world. And who wants to be disabused of that? Right now one friend of mine, who reviewed a story negatively, is receiving death threats from the author. Really. I can sort of sympathize with both parties in this. The author should never have read that review. My friend should maybe choose a nobler occupation, like chimney sweep. When I reviewed books at the Philadelphia Inquirer many years ago, my arrangement with them was that I got to select the books and if I hated the book, I didn't write anything about it at all--which seemed cruel enough to me. I didn't get paid for my time, and the author never got his name in the paper. Of course, as a result eventually I had to go out and find a paying job.
While it may be possible to use a bad review to advantage, personally I never want to see one. If you love my book, please tell me, please gush, please worship and heap praise with a shovel. If you hate it, please contact the aliens and be taken up to the Mother Ship immediately. That constructivist approach reminds me too much of the actor who said when he wanted to mess up another actor's performance in a play, he would describe to that actor all the wonderful things the actor was doing. The result was, his victim became so self-conscious of all his turns and phrasings that it ruined every performance after that. (This is akin to George Lucas believing after 3 Star Wars movies that he'd been inspired all along by Joseph Campbell because a reviewer claimed he must have been, with the result that, armed with that faux knowledge, he made 6 more films that were so wretched, many of us wanted our money back before the end of the Main Titles.
I prefer to keep a filter between me and the reviewers, someone who looks at the reviews and then tells me "you can see this one", but keeps the others away from me. This is, I've found, not uncommon among writers and artists. Spouses or friends or agents will act as a kind of shield. My experience with bad reviews is that I take them personally, probably more so than I should, more so than is healthy. And I've watched other writers melt down over bad reviews. I've seen 'em scream and rant and rave. I've seen them vengefully put particularly noxious critics into their books as (not making this up) the parasitic creatures who live inside the anus of dragons, sucking off the dragon's shit. I've also seen reviewers go after writers just for the hell of it, because they have an axe to grind, or they have taken it upon their little inflated selves to determine that it's time for this author to be brought down a peg because, oh, the author's had a string of too many damned successes; the critic is tired of hearing how wonderful the author is; the critic thinks he's Rufus Griswold reincarnated, etc., so shoving them up a dragon's butt does not seem unjust to me.
Whatever the case, to me, once the book or story is written and turned in, and I'm happy with it, I much prefer to stay happy with it. And it's not as if it can be called back post- publication and "fixed". So there's not much can be done in response to sharp criticism but get depressed and drink, become a drug addict and eventually die in dementia while roaming the streets of Baltimore.
I think at some level we all believe we're geniuses and our craft will prove this to the world. And who wants to be disabused of that? Right now one friend of mine, who reviewed a story negatively, is receiving death threats from the author. Really. I can sort of sympathize with both parties in this. The author should never have read that review. My friend should maybe choose a nobler occupation, like chimney sweep. When I reviewed books at the Philadelphia Inquirer many years ago, my arrangement with them was that I got to select the books and if I hated the book, I didn't write anything about it at all--which seemed cruel enough to me. I didn't get paid for my time, and the author never got his name in the paper. Of course, as a result eventually I had to go out and find a paying job.