Here are a couple of thought-provoking blog posts I read this week.
Heidenkind has a interesting post called Why I Don’t Rate My Reviews – A Manifesto. As anyone who reads my reviews will know, I do assign grades to them, although I realize the system isn’t perfect. Do you prefer reviews with grades or without?
At Romancing the Blog, Eric Selinger writes about required reading at his son’s school and how the emphasis seems to be on books written by men and featuring male protagonists. I attended an all girls school but the books we read for English class had a mix of male and female protagonists. I’m assuming Eric’s son attends a co-ed school. Do you agree with his suspicion that the school has simply given up trying to persuade the boys to read books featuring a female point of view?
Jane at Dear Author has a great piece on How to Get Into Book Reviewing as a Blogger. It’s got tons of tips on how to go about soliciting Advanced Reading Copies, etc. If you are a review blogger, have you actively sought ARCs? I have been sent a couple of ARCs but I haven’t actively pursued them due to a lack of reading time. If I agreed to review an ARC, I’d want to do so in a timely fashion, and that’s not something I can guarantee at the moment.
Enjoy your weekend!
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I like grades on reviews but they can also muddle things. I prefer the points thing out of 10 or 100 rather than letter grades, they are a bit clearer to me, but I am thick.
I prefer grades or some reference system to how well the reader liked the book. To me a review is just incomplete without a grade. I used to just say at the end of my reviews – recommend or highly recommended. But in the end, grades don’t mean anything to me unless the person behind the review has my trust and shares my tastes in books. So, I guess I concur in that grades are probably meaningless to some readers.
I want a grade. Just do.
Required reading (regardless of protagonist gender) is a big reason why so many people get turned off from reading. I love to read, but even I forgot that it could be “fun” after slogging through 5+ years of university and earning two degrees.
I do not solicit ARCs. 1) Because my TBR can be seen from space 2) it’s only me, with no “staff” of reviewers and 3) I only want to read books I want to read. I’m not going to force myself to read a sub genre I’m burnt out on, or a trope I can’t stand, just because I got an ARC. I don’t want that obligation.
Very good topics of discussion here.
I don’t grade my reviews and I really don’t pay attention to others’ grads. I look for what they actually say about the book. I’ve read reviews where their words and rating didn’t match, ended up not sure what they really felt about the book.
I read an article awhile back, that the coed/public school system are geared towards teaching boys, I wish I could remember where I read it. It also went on to say that’s why a larger number of girls are not as proficient in math as they should be because of they way the schools structure their curriculum. This could definitely be a hot topic of discussion, with no clear cut answer.
I read the article by Jane, very informative. I don’t ask for ARCs because I read for fun and I prefer to keep it that way, pretty much for the same reasons as Wendy. But I have accepted a couple of ARCs only because they were books I was dying to read and would of read anyways when they published.
@Edie The different grading systems have their pros and cons. The other issue I’m aware of is that the lettered grade system I had in school in Ireland is not quite the same as the one in the US. When I started assigning grades to the books I read, it was after years of reading reviews at All About Romance, so I sort of got a feel for what the various grades meant using their system.
@Keishon I find a grade gives me the option to wait to read the actual review until after I’ve read the book, which I generally do in the case of books I already own or know I want to read.
@Donna (Fantasy Dreamer) I know what you mean about the words and the rating not always matching. I’ve read reviews of books which the reviewer raved about and then assigned a ‘B’. It was unclear to me why she chose to give it a ‘B’ and not an ‘A’ as she didn’t criticize a single thing about the story.
Thanks, Wendy. That summarizes my feelings on ARCs exactly.
I am stuck on grading books. Blame it on my old school days. I personally prefer letter grades, but that’s just me.
@katiebabs Letter grades are also my preference, with out of 10 or out of 100 grading systems coming joint second.
I like to see a book reviewed by letter grades. It gives me a good guide to how the reviewer feels and I can agree or disagree. Reviewers I like tend to feel the same way as I do about a book. As for the choices of books in schools, I went to an all-girls high school and the books on the curriculum were quite balanced, though overwhelmingly depressing for teenage girls – from Sylvia Plath’s ‘The Bell Jar’ to John Knowles’ ‘A Separate Peace’. How the hell did we survive those without mass suicide at Mercy High School, San Francisco??
@Trish ‘The Bell Jar’ in particular is relentlessly depressing. I’m surprised that was required reading for teenagers. Mind you, we had the cocaine-fueled ravings of W.B. Yeats for Leaving Cert. Honours English.
As a teacher (or at least a former teacher), letter grades remind me too much of work. They are the rating system that seems the most flexible, however, so if I were to rate books, I’d probably use letter grades. Or just pick random things like flowers or seashells.
I’ve never solicited for ARC’s. The thought hadn’t even occurred to me. I did like Jane’s post, but to be honest that sounds like too much work for me at the moment (yeah, I’m super-lazy). Although if Christina Dodd or Lisa Kleypas felt like mailing me an ARC of their next book, I’d be totally down with that.
@heidenkind If Julia Spencer-Fleming wants to send me an ARC of her next book, do you think I’d refuse? Hell, no!
I prefer grades.
Why?
Because reviews are too spoilery and I can’t trust reviewers not to spill the beans on something essential.
When I see reviews for a book I think I might be interested in, I read the first sentence or two, then I skip to the end for the final grade, hoping I won’t catch any spoilers in between. When I see reviews for a book I’m unlikely to read, I give the review a skim and then look at the final grade.
I only ever read full reviews for a book that I’ve already read.
I like to know why a reviewer did or didn’t like the book, but I don’t ever want to know anything about the book itself. No, I don’t make it easy
I’m similar. If I know I want to read the book, I look at the grade and come back to read the review after I’ve finished the book. However, if I know nothing about the book, I read the review. I’ve often bought books as a result.