Wednesday, January 28, 2015

The Elusive Amazon Review

I wish this was  a helpful post on how to get those precious Amazon reviews but it is not. I did read some ebook that said you can get Amazon reviews for an ebook if you made it into a contest where the person buys the book, leaves a review and then  is entered into a contest to win a Kindle Fire. I don't know who has the kind of money to invest in a brand new Kindle Fire to give away. Of course, I suppose you could always write it off on your taxes.

As many of you know, I struggle with getting reviews probably like most independent writers. I am grateful for the couple 4 and 5 star reviews on my two Christmas books, Nickolaus and Santa's Shorts and I am even sort of grateful for the one star review on my novel. I also have a review in the UK market for my book, The Wolf's Red Rose. What prompted this query is a horrible poetry book I read the other day.

When I am bored, I will root through the Kindle store and find all the ebooks that are free and  sound good. Since I have a love affair with poetry, I got a free poetry book. I don't always get poetry books for free. I do read my free books especially when I want something quick to read and I have nothing else better to do and I have read some really stellar stories. This poetry book was horrible. It was horrible in almost every possible way. So to be nosey, I went to the Kindle store and this poet had 5 star reviews with glowing sentiments such as "this was so beautiful". Well, I guess you know the saying, one man's trash is another's treasure.  This book got a three star review just for effort. I did not leave a review. I don't know;  I just  couldn't do it, I couldn't just rip this person to shreds although I really wanted to. 

And this brings me to the topic of the day.... WHAT PROMPTS YOU TO LEAVE A REVIEW WHEN YOU READ A KINDLE BOOK?

So I mentioned before, I don't review the books I read and some of them deserve reviews. I don't leave reviews and I don't know why. I thought about reviewing books this year as a part of some karma thing where I review books and then the universe will give me reviews. But, what if I read something horrible like the aforementioned poetry book? I know reviews mean a lot to an author and in this business you need to have a skin made of granite, but could I be mean?

Sometimes, the book sounds good but it is boring when I get into it. I wonder how many people are like me. How many people in the Kindle universe get free books and never read them? Or just read some of the book? How many people in the Kindle universe are independent writers  and don't want to hurt other author's feelings because we kind of to have each other's backs (like we are in the same team or something).

Here I am stuck between thinking my work is worthy and thinking that my work sucks.  Is it egotistical to think my poetry book is much better than the bad poetry book I read? Or is it confidence? I am left wondering, if my writing is boring, did I bore the fuck out of you as you read this post? (Side note- if you made it this far, I couldn't have bored you too much).

Honestly, sometimes it is nice to hear someone enjoyed my work. There is a special warm fuzzy feeling I get  when someone tells me they like something I wrote or created. It is a feeling that lasts for a moment but I never get tired of it. It's that atta boy that we all love hearing for a job well done.

Tell me what you think.

Until next time....

No comments:

Post a Comment