IT’S THE VERB THAT MAKES THE NOUN.
Believe, believe, believe. And magic happens in the real world.
My View of Reviews
Okay, so I’m going to start this one out with a few clarifiers:
1) I speak only for myself, no one else.
2) There are no hidden messages here.
3) Other people have had other experiences and have different viewpoints on this (see also my first statement above), and everyone has a right to their opinion.
4) Just to be sure, see also my second statement one more time. I’m a hermit and don’t know many people in this business, so not only am I not familiar with the conventional wisdom on reviews and reviewers, I couldn’t begin to even guess at it.
With those ground rules, allow me to be very, very frank. (Yes, because I am so good at being shy and retiring.) I’ve had every kind of review there is to be had. I’ve had people say they love my books, they hate my books, they love my characters, they hate my characters, they love me, they hate me. Back in the beginning, I read my reviews, in large measure because I was so frickin’ glad anyone was reading my books, I just wanted to reassure myself that yes, people were actually buying them, and yes, I actually did, maybe, possibly have a career.
But I quickly learned something. By letting the opinions of others into my head, it created a chaos that made concentration difficult. I’ve long held the conviction that no author can write to a committee. This is why I never was part of a critique group. Back in the beginning, I had one person I would check in with on scenes that I was worried about (Jessica Andersen) and my editor, and that was it. Now, all these years later,I have Nath, my research assistant, Liz Berry, and my editor (Editing Jess add-on: And now Liz Berry IS my editor for this secondInsider’s Guidelolololol!) That’s it. The thing is, reading is highly subjective. What one person likes, another loathes. If you try to please too many viewpoints, you file down your highs and lows. And a corollary to this, at least in my case, is that my Rice Krispies don’t care about my opinion of the storylines or the people in them. They do their own thing, and I record it. That’s my job. That’s it. So it’s not like I have a lot to work with when it comes to writing to please anybody.
So no, I do not read my reviews. But here’s the thing. They’re not meant for me. They’re not my business. Just as readers are not welcome in the sacred space of my writing, I am not welcome in the sacred space of their reviewing and commenting among themselves about my books. Reviews are for readers, not authors. If someone puts down their good money for a copy of something you wrote, or if they receive a copy of something you wrote as part of a PR package, they have every right in the world to think it’s a piece of sh*t and tell people that. They have every right in the world to find your heroine weak and your hero a bully and your series a waste of time. They do not owe you anything. It does not matter that you put your heart and soul into the book. It doesn’t matter that you went through and reedited it a hundred thousand times. It doesn’t matter that you birthed what was, in your mind, a masterpiece. It doesn’t matter.
Reviews are for readers. They are not for authors.
Here’s the thing. I feel very close to my readers. I love them all. But I go to my family and friends for acknowledgement of my efforts and focus. For relief from the back-breaking hours of sitting in a chair seeing no one, talking to no one, doing nothing but typing on the keyboard. For an attagirl, and a pat on the back, or a poor baby when sh*t is not going well. I never expect that from my readers. To me, my relationship with my readersis a one-way street. I do the giving. They are not required to do anything in return. It’s the nature of the job, and boy, am I grateful as hell for every single one of the people who buy my books. SO GRATEFUL.
And here’s another truism. Not every book I write is good. Some are awesome. Some are meh, with awesome parts. Some are corkers with great beginnings, or cringers with great endings, or ones I wish I could have gone through one more time before release. I am under no illusion that I write masterpieces, and I know for a fact that I have made mistakes. And the thing is, readers are not dumb. They see all those faults. They keep reading because they see all the good parts, too. And they are allowed to explain, in big detail or none at all, what worked for them and what didn’t.
Do I get excited when people come up and tell me they love something I did? F*ck yeah! I love my J. R. Ward event in Cinci every year when we all get together and talk about the Brothers. And I love the support on social media. And I love the fact that people buy my books. And I am the luckiest person on the planet.
But I stay in my lane. My lane is writing, and doing my best with what I have for each release. I also totally recognize and respect the reviewers’ right to like all or part or none of anything I put out. After all, even if I don’t read what people say about my books, other people do, and should.
What about abuse though, you might ask. What about reviewers who stray way off topic and get personal? It’s a fair question. And listen, I’ve had death threats put in to reviews (my security detail tracks these things). Back in the old days, I was called a hack, a loser, about every slur you can think of for a woman, for a writer, for a human being. I’m sure there are people out there still slinging that kind of mud. But I don’t seek it out, and I don’t read it, and I do my job. I can’t controlthe haters. I can, however, just keep doing my thing and stay positive and move along.
Look, I am not in any position to tell any writer what to do or feel about anything. I would, however, like to urge authors to remember what our job is. Our job is to put the stories in our heads on the page, and if you offer them up on a commercial platform for consumption, they are then officially out of your hands and into the hands of others—who will, and should, have opinions about what they’ve read. As for personal attacks, the world is not a kind place. People can be cruel, and sometimes deliberately so. People can also be horrendously, unforgivably nasty, especially on the internet, saying things they would never dare spit out to someone’s face. It’s a fact of where we are as a society, and it hurts. It absolutely does. It can ruin your day, your week. It can make you feel powerless and collapse your confidence. It can make you want to throw in the towel and give up, especially if there are challenges elsewhere. But here’s the thing. Can you control that? No. Can you change their minds? No. Can you ever win the argument, even if you’re right? No. Therefore, don’t go there. Your work must come first. That’s what Sue (Grafton) always told me. The work must come first. And if you allow yourself to get thought up about stuff you can’t control and you can’t change, you’re no better than the trolls on the internet when it comes to working against yourself.
(Editing Jess add-on: Just so I’m clear, racism, homophobia, ableism, hate speech of ANY kind is NEVER, EVER OKAY. I’m NOT referring to that here. That sh*t can f*ck right off.)
Anywho, that’s what I think about reviews. And as I said, others may have different opinions, and I don’t know everything (and in some cases, I don’t know anything at all!). I am, however, bedrock sure about the following:
The work comes first. You have to believe, believe, believe in yourself. And magic happens in the real world.
The Success Ladder
So, back seven hundred and fifty million years ago, before e-readers and iPhones, before Amazon and Audible, before social media and the internet, I went to my first Romance Writers of America local chapter meeting. It was the New England subspecies of the larger whole, and we gathered in a room—I think it was a basement—in a library in like, Wellesley or Framingham, MA. Someone was having a birthday so there was a cake. We sat in an open horseshoe of student desks—or maybe it was just tables with chairs, but I’m pretty sure it was a horseshoe.
I was the newbie. I knew no one and tried to take as unobtrusive a seat as possible. I’m tall and I’ve always been tall. When you grow up being bigger than all of the girls and most of the boys, year after year, it doesn’t help with social anxiety, especially if you’re an introvert to begin with. Consequently, even now as an adult, every time I walk into any room full of people I don’t know, I feel like a cumbersome, enormous freak that everyone is giggling about.
Of course, now, with my bad eyes and fondness for high heels, I have self-medicated this issue by wearing sunglasses indoors and not just being taller, but towering over people—but that is another discussion, one better for my therapist and I to cover. lolol
Anyway, I’m sitting there with all these women who not only knew each other, but had publishing experience, and I felt like a total f*cking fraud. I knew nothing about publishing,manuscripts, PR, the market, publishers, agents. The idea of becoming a professional author was a massive mountain in front of me, one I had no idea how to scale. I remember being totally intimidated and terrified, and I didn’t know where I was going to find the courage to come to a second meeting.
When you care so much about something, the slightest doubt in yourself can get magnified until it overtakes every strength you have.
And I REALLY wanted to write.
So, we had a speaker that day. I can’t remember who. I can’t remember what topic they spoke about. I can’t remember much of anything. (Except for Jessica Andersen reporting that she had a contract with Silhouette or Harlequin. Little did I know she and I would become so incredibly close over the years. All hail Doc Jess! Oh, and the cake.)
What I do remember about the Q&A after the presentation was that it was the first time I heard someone talk about the success ladder. I don’t recall who brought it up, but the point was this. We all start on the same ground line. (Editing Jess add-on: When this post came out, I was very rightly criticized for not acknowledging that I have a lot of advantages other people do NOT have. I was grateful for the correction, and really took it to heart—and continue to do so. BIPOC authors, for example, have challenges I do not have, so this “same ground line” is really bullsh*t. I’m keeping it in here, however, as a way to continue to be accountable.) In front of each of us is a ladder. With every piece we write and revise, every contact we make, every sale we execute, every book that comes out, we go up a rung. If we look to the left, and to the right, we will see people who move faster than us. There will be writers who climb quick and high and don’t break a sweat. There are people who will go up at our same pace. There are others who we will pass. Some years, we will rung-after-rung it, going steady, making progress. Other years,we will lose ground and find ourselves at a lower level. Still other twelve-month spans will see us making no headway at all.
