Author’s temper tantrum good lesson for writers

May 2nd, 2011

By Patti Thorn, BlueInk Managing Partner

Looking for a review of your book? There’s a lesson to be learned in the case of Jacqueline Howett. Howett’s angry response to a bad review of her book posted online went viral, and now her fit is nearly as infamous as the punch Snooki took to the jaw on Jersey Shore.

Here’s the backstory:

Howett wrote and published an ebook novel titled The Greek Seaman. She then managed to get it reviewed by a blogger – not an easy task in this world of exploding digital content. So far, so good.

But all good things must end, and Howett’s good thing ended the moment the review came out. While the blogger thought Howett’s story had some merit, he complained of its many grammatical errors and difficult-to read sentence structure. Few readers, he said, would persevere through the thicket of obstacles to experience the story.

Howett was not amused.

She accused the reviewer of reading the wrong format (he insists this was not the case). She said her Amazon reviewers gave the book “5 stars and 4 stars and they say they really enjoyed the Greek Seaman and thought it was really well written.” She posted 3 of those reviews, just to prove her case.

She was just getting warmed up.

Back in the heyday of newspapers, they used to say: never pick a fight with those who buy ink by the barrel. Someone should have updated that warning for Howett: never pick a fight with those who have a forward button on their computer.

After she posted her response to the review, others began posting on the site in support of the reviewer. And Howett, summoning all graciousness and restraint, told the blogger that his behavior was “discusting” (proving his point that she was no Strunk or White).  She then called him a liar. This fueled the fire until Howett lost it altogether and told her online tormenters to “Fuck off!”…Not once, but twice.

(In case you’re wondering if Howett had a right to be angry at the review, here are a few sentences from her book, posted by the reviewer:

“She carried her stocky build carefully back down the stairs.”

“Don and Katy watched hypnotically Gino place more coffees out at another table with supreme balance.”

That deafening sound you hear is every English teacher in America clucking their tongues in unison.)

By the end, more than 300 people had all piled on Howett, and the whole interchange went viral. No one, it seems, was impressed with the hapless author’s ability to handle criticism.

Aside from giving everyone a chuckle, Howett’s temper tantrum should serve as a reality check to other authors. At BlueInk Review, we are occasionally in the unfortunate position of handing out bad reviews and responding to upset authors. Like Howett, the authors often defend themselves by telling us that others loved their book: family and friends, reviewers on Amazon, etc.

One author recently protested his review by saying that he had 11  4- and 5-star reviews on Amazon – all for a book our reviewer found “atrocious.”  The online reviews, our critic pointed out to us, were all from first-time Amazon reviewers (can you say “friends and family”?)

If there’s one thing you learn quickly in this business of criticism, it’s this: never trust feedback from friends and family. Friends and family don’t like to hurt the feelings of friends and family. Case in point: I was at dinner recently with my girlfriend, Lori, who was in the midst of a dilemma. A colleague of hers had just self published a book. Lori was invited to the upcoming booksigning.  The book was dreadful, Lori said. What was she going to tell her friend when asked if she liked it?

After much discussion, she came to a decision: “I’m going to tell her it was great!” she said.

That’s what friends do for friends. And, let’s be honest, friends also write lots of 4- and 5-star reviews on Amazon for friends.

The point is this: Howett’s defensiveness will only kill her own progress as a writer. An objective, third-party critique is not only helpful, but absolutely essential to a writer’s understanding of his or her work. Whether that critique comes from a fellow author, a teacher, or a professional critic, few can learn without it.

Yes, such feedback is only one person’s opinion. But in the hands of a professional critic, at least, that one person is someone who understands the genre, is widely read, can recognize the difference between a powerful sentence and a muddled one and – most importantly — doesn’t worry about losing a friend by articulating the pros and cons of the work. An objective assessment is far more valuable than asking Aunt Sadie or your English major buddy what they think of your work.

Writers who believe in their craft should seek out objective reviews, as Howett did — then have the wisdom to receive the result with some introspection. Sure, getting a bad review hurts. But it also has the power to instruct. After reading a review, an author should take a deep breath. Take a jog around the block. Take a tranquilizer, if she must. But finally, when she has stopped seeing red, she needs to look at what the reviewer is saying and try to understand where she might have gone off track and discern what she can do differently next time.

Oh yeah. And she would do well to avoid telling the reviewer to F— off — especially in full view of the Internet public. Being humiliated in front of thousands of web voyeurs is no way to launch a career.

Unless, of course, you’re Snooki.

Live, learn…and be aware of e-reader brands!

February 28th, 2011

By Patti Thorn, BlueInk Managing Partner

We have been busy “officially” launching our website. When you’re a new business, “officially” launching means you put together a long list of press contacts, cross your fingers and hope for some coverage so that you can spread the word.

We spent days blasting out emails to trade publications, newspapers, bloggers, e-zines, friends, neighbors, the person who mans the school crosswalk, our favorite checkers at the grocery store, a few men holding signs on the street corner…

We also blasted out emails to librarians, booksellers, publishers and agents, letting them know we are here.

Then we waited for the earth to move.

Here’s one thing I learned: you can wait a long time for the earth to move when you’re hoping for press coverage.

Here’s another thing I learned: if you’re hoping to get booksellers to love your site, never tell them you’re holding a drawing for a free Kindle for anyone who signs up for your mailing list. No sooner had we shipped off emails to booksellers across the country letting them know about BlueInk, than an email popped up in our inbox. It was a thank you and a scolding all wrapped in one.

It said:

“Really like this idea for a service…go ahead and sign us up.

“*Extremely* turned off by your offer of a free Kindle as will anyone at any indie bookstore, B&N, Borders, publisher being blackmailed by Amazon anyone at all selling books other than Amazon, whom I presume is not your market.

“A more benign choice might’ve been a Sony.”

Uh. Excellent point.

We turned five shades of red. The bookseller was absolutely right: there are divisions here that we need to be sensitive to. And we appreciated the reminder.

We are still busy sending out follow-up emails. And more follow-up emails.

I can’t say the earth has exactly moved. (And after seeing the rubble in New Zealand, I guess we should be grateful it didn’t!) But we’ve heard some subterranean rumbles.

Richard Curtis, a lovely man and supreme literary agent, gave us a boost in his blog on e-reads. Publishers Marketplace announced our formation. And Publishing Trends sent us a list of questions in advance of a promised article. We hope our answers were as good as the reporter’s questions and are awaiting the article.

We’ll see what comes next.

Meanwhile, we’ll soon hold the drawing we promised for an e-reader. Check out the notice on our landing page. It now says we’ll be giving away a free Nook*.

Live and learn.

*Yes, we know that the Nook is a Barnes & Noble product. But unlike the Kindle, you can download books from anywhere (except Amazon) on a Nook and even from the library,  so we hope independent booksellers will approve. As for the Sony e-reader, I can’t recall the last time I heard someone mention that with longing in their eyes…

Frank talk about fees

December 30th, 2010

By Patti Thorn, BlueInk Managing Partner

This blog entry is written in response to a Facebook post questioning our business model of fee-based reviews.

An official of the Independent Publishing Resource Center wrote: “… The IPRC is all for helping independent authors and getting more reviews for self-publishing books, but we must admit we’re a bit skeptical about paying to have your book reviewed. Blue Ink, how do you avoid conflicts of interest when you’re accepting payment from the very authors you review?”

As the issue is likely to come up often, given the newness of this model, I thought it best to post our response in my blog, where others can see the question addressed, as well. Sorry to be so long-winded, but the subject requires some background and depth. Here goes…

Dear IPRC:

We realize this is a new way of approaching reviews and, as such, is bound to be controversial.  But we are adamant in our answer to the question you pose: Can a fee-based review be trusted to be objective?

Absolutely.

Fee-based book reviews can be trusted if the company delivering the review operates with utmost integrity – just as with any other kind of review.

Ultimately, no matter the funding model, the “trustworthiness” of a review comes down to those in charge of making decisions: ensuring that each book is assigned to the appropriate critic and that each review offers fair and ample evidence to back up its assertions, positive or negative. Whether the reviews truly reflect the worthiness of the book is only proven over time, as readers try the books recommended and come to trust that they are getting decent guidance from that publication’s reviews.

Our business model is not only based on providing reviews to authors; it’s based on promoting those reviews to readers and industry decision makers: librarians, booksellers, agents, publishers. We aren’t just aiming to be a review service, but a place people go to find the best that self publishing has to offer. If, as some skeptics suggest, we decided to attract self publishers by offering only rave reviews, we would turn off the other half of our audience, those potentially buying the books, and our service would quickly become useless to all.

We believe over time, you will see that our reviews are trustworthy and that we are operating with unimpeachable integrity. In our former careers in the traditional book world, we have proven that integrity time and again, and have earned the respect of those who have worked with us, as well as readers at large.

Furthermore, to think there is no conflict of interest in the traditional model is simply being naïve. Traditionally, print publications (consider Publishers Weekly or even The New York Times Book Review) have been financed in large part by advertisements from the publishing industry. Thus, there has always been an inherent tension between the needs of those advertisers and the goals of critical objectivity. The key to ensuring objectivity in those publications has been in maintaining a firewall between critics and advertisers.

At BlueInk, we work under the exact same premise. As with print publications, we manage the conflicting agendas of the person funding the review and the critic by strictly maintaining that firewall between the two parties. Our critics have no contact with authors submitting books for review. And authors have no knowledge of which reviewers have been assigned to critique their books.

While we charge a fee for each review (which goes to fund our business operations and, most importantly, to pay reviewers – who, after all, deserve fair compensation for their work), the reviews are in no way influenced by that fee. (For example, authors cannot pay more to get a Starred Review or BlueInk Best Book Award – or even a few glowing adjectives thrown into their review for good measure.) Authors pay up front; no refunds are given unless the review contains substantive factual errors.

In producing our reviews, we follow strictly the same standards used by any reputable review publication.

Our critics – who come from the traditional publishing world and are well aware of traditional review ethics – follow written guidelines instructing them to craft objective, honest reviews and to note both the positive and negative points of any book. They are asked to judge each book on the merit of its content (not on the quality of its production) and to judge that content against the publishing world at large, not simply the self-publishing world.

They are also instructed to notify us immediately if they have any conflict of interest with a particular book so that we can replace them with a different reviewer.

We use highly qualified reviewers, and authors can see who those reviewers are. Their bios are listed on our site and on our Facebook page. We also post the letter we send instructing reviewers on how to craft their reviews, so everyone can see what is being communicated. We hope this kind of transparency will allow those initially skeptical to feel more comfortable with our service.

In the digital world, it has become a necessity to find new ways of supporting editorial ventures. No one is more aware of this than I am (as a former book review editor who lost her job when the Rocky Mountain News closed, falling victim to the crumbling business model for print publications). This is a particular dilemma in the self-publishing world, as the enormity of the pool of material and its vast unevenness in terms of quality makes screening such work a huge and potentially expensive undertaking. (This is why, until recently, self-publishers had little access to reviews of any kind. Most mainstream publications are overwhelmed with titles from traditional publishing houses, and even authors published by traditional houses can’t be assured of getting a review – especially in this climate, as book sections in newspapers across the country are downsized or eliminated, and newspapers close. Most mainstream publications have policies rejecting self-published books, as it’s simply too difficult to cover all those bases with the limited resources they have.)

We feel it’s not unfair to ask self-publishers to assume some of the burden of this cost. Self-publishers are, in fact, publishers. And in addition to bearing the cost of producing a book, publishers have always taken on the expense of getting the word out about their books, as well. One of the most powerful tools an author can have for marketing a book is a critical, objective appraisal.

BlueInk offers a solution for self-publishers who have been frustrated at their inability to attain honest reviews. Perhaps it’s not the only solution, and another model may evolve. If so, we weren’t able to envision it at this time.

In any case, we have worked hard to provide a service that will justify our fees – one tailored specifically to the needs of self publishers. We have spent endless hours debating the best ways to address those needs. For example, we realize that many self publishers want to attract traditional publishers. Thus, we thought they should have a way to let publishers know if their book is earning accolades, or selling particularly well, as these are things agents and publishers look for in acquiring new material. Authors can do this on our site (yes, it’s an added fee, but well worth the cost if an author has solid bona fides to promote).

We also realize that they might want the attention of librarians; thus, our special search allows librarians to sort books by region in order to determine if particular titles by local authors would be worthy of putting on their shelves.

And we know, being book lovers ourselves, that readers don’t want to buy a book unless they can browse through it first. We make Google Books Preview available for all books reviewed on our site – a service that allows visitors to read directly inside the book. We also provide links to the author’s websites so readers can learn more about each author.

We hope to offer other features as we get feedback from those who use our site –  authors, readers and industry professionals alike.

We feel all of these services warrant the fee and hope self-publishing authors will see the benefits as well. Bottom line: we are committed to producing reviews that adhere to time-honored ethical standards and are worthy of our web audience’s trust and respect at all times. We just ask that you keep an open mind and give us a chance to earn your trust as time goes on.

The view from here looks grand

December 9th, 2010

By Patti Thorn, BlueInk Managing Partner

We are gloriously, happily, finally live!

I know. I know. We’re not the first to launch a website.

But the emotion still seems like how I imagine those who built the Eiffel Tower must have felt when they put that last steel girder in place: Ah! Finally, time to relax for a minute and survey the view!

It’s a grand view, indeed – one that started with a simple conversation about the publishing world, all about how the traditional ways were crumbling as editors at New York publishing houses lost their jobs and companies struggled to navigate the challenges of the new digital world. About how self publishing was exploding. And about how readers were caught in the middle of all this: how were they to know what books were worth their time in this new anything-goes reality? In the traditional publishing world, readers get guidance from reviews in mainstream publications. But self publishers are left out in the cold when it comes to reviews, and that means readers are, too.

I knew this better than most. For 12 years, as books editor at the Rocky Mountain News, I was the person self publishers called, asking for reviews. I was also the unfortunate one whose task was to tell them that, sorry, we don’t review self-published books. (Before you go pounding out an angry email, whoa there. I can explain – but it will take more than a few sentences in parentheses. I promise to address that issue in another blog entry. Honest.)

I often felt terrible about delivering this bad news. Authors constantly voiced their frustrations: they had spent thousands of dollars getting their books in print – but without a review or some kind of exposure in the newspaper, how would they find readers? The experience left me thinking of the great need for some kind of filtering process, a way these many self-published books could get critical appraisal.

Meanwhile, my partner and BlueInk cofounder Patty Moosbrugger was still well ensconced in the publishing world. A successful book agent, she had built her own business from scratch and was now enjoying the fruits of her labors, with a roster of respected authors relying on her advocacy and guidance. Even so, she was beginning to see the advantages some authors had in self publishing their books. With the traditional publishing world in its current state of flux, sometimes authors were better off producing their own books, working like crazy at marketing them, and taking the lion’s share of the profits.

The discussion led to brainstorming, which led to a simple idea: why not create a forum in which self-published authors have access to credible, honest, objective book reviews?

Did I say simple? That’s like saying the Eiffel Tower is no more complicated than a Tinker Toy.

Actually, it’s taken nine months of serious thought and debate to crystallize our purpose. We’ve conferred with librarians, agents and booksellers about what they look for in self-published books. We’ve talked to self-publishing authors and attended self-publishing conferences, asking questions and trying to discern the best ways to serve this diverse group.

We’ve torn our hair out devising business plans and budgets. We’ve learned more about web development than we ever wanted to (don’t ask). (Here’s one interesting thing we learned: what we call “air” in the newspaper world – meaning the white space around the text and photos — is called “oxygen” in the web world. Who says those Gen Yers weren’t paying attention in school?)

And we’ve had plenty of heated discussions along the way. Just coming up with a name for our company took hours and hours of debate. I, for one, am still mourning my discarded favorite, “NewBigFish.com.” (Ok, I’m willing to admit that maybe it wasn’t such a good sign that every time one of us brought it up for discussion, we forgot the order of the words: BigNewFish? NewFishWhatAgain? And when I told my 20something daughter my idea, she looked at me as if I’d swallowed big fish – and then spat it out at her feet.) There were many days we had to take a deep breath and remind ourselves of our larger goals.

Which is what has kept us going. We launch our new venture filled with excitement and hope that we can be part of the future of publishing.  We have a grand vision: that not only can we help individual authors by providing them with honest reviews they can use in their marketing materials, but that we can help readers, too. The self-publishing world is huge and growing like mad. It is filled with amazing material – and, yes, not-so-amazing, material. How can readers know what is worth their attention?

We hope to be the answer to that question. Over time, we hope that when readers are presented with a self-published book, the first thing they’ll ask is “Did BlueInk like it?” Or “What did BlueInk say?” We hope readers looking for new material will routinely search our Notable Reviews with anticipation, just as they might have opened up The Saturday Evening News to read its featured fiction piece in the heydey of print.

We hope, in short, that as e-books and iPads and the myriad other technical innovations evolve, we become the filter by which the best written work is recognized, no matter the format.

In this blog, I’ll be talking about our progress; the contrasts I see between the old world (newspapers and print books) vs. the new world (online publications and e-books); developments in the self-publishing world and anything else that seems interesting. Join the conversation, if you feel so moved. Or just check in now and then and browse what’s being said.

It’s great to be here on the precipice of this new world. And it’s especially gratifying, after so many months of planning, to push this little “Blue” bird out of the nest. Let us know what you think of our site when you get a minute.

Meanwhile, all this talk about our long view is making me a little dizzy. Time to get back on the ground and take things one step at a time. I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to announce that step one is finally a fait accompli: We’re live!