You might think I’m reading more because of the pandemic.
You would be wrong.
Tag Archives: Star ratings
Recent Reads – August to December 2019 (pt.2): Mixed Reviews, Mixed Feelings, and the Scale of My Indecision
Last week, I wrote about how I don’t often give books five-star ratings.
Even less often do I give one-star.
Recent Reads – August to December 2019 (pt.1): A Five-Star Extravaganza
I’ve mentioned before how I review every book that I read.
It surely goes without saying that I love writing five-star reviews best of all.
Recent Reads – April to July 2019
The hardest part about reading is knowing when to stop.
This is obviously true when a gripping story threatens to keep you up well past your bedtime. And all the more so in the midst of a book that is decidedly opposite to that.
Recent Reads – January to March 2019
Five years ago, I wrote a post on how to read 12 books in a year.
Twelve books a year doesn’t trouble me anymore, but it did at the time. I found myself floundering beneath the burden of various competing obligations, some mandatory, some discretionary, and that reading, my oldest pastime, had fallen far by the wayside.
Recent Reads – November to December 2018
Renowned horror/supernatural/spec fic author Stephen King famously claimed the following:
“If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.”
He’s right in more ways than one. The tools that reading has to offer are numerous.
Recent Reads – April to October 2018
I haven’t done nearly enough reading this year.
I started 2018 off strong, with my previous Recent Reads post from January to March including four completed books.
(Well technically, three books and one novella, but one of those books was a reference for the next historical fiction novel I plan to write. Reading that required highlighting and note-taking that slowed me down considerably, and perhaps balances out the novella’s shorter length.)
Recent Reads – January to March 2018
As I discussed in a previous blog post, I review every book that I read on Goodreads.
I do this in my dual roles of both writer and reader, the former to help my fellow writers try to generate book sales, and the latter because I just enjoy sharing my opinions about what I’m reading.
Should Writers Write Book Reviews?
I review every book that I read on Goodreads.
I do this because I’m a writer with aspirations of future publication and strong book sales.
I’m aware of how crucial reviews are to authors, both in helping produce those strong sales and in enabling one to (traditionally) publish subsequent books.
Why I Don’t Read Five-Star Book Reviews
Ever since my very first Amazon book purchase on October 25, 2002, I’ve never stopped debating myself on the value of customer book reviews.
(If you ever want to enjoy a nostalgia-filled blast through the past, go through your Amazon purchase history order by order, year by year, back to the very beginning.)
On the one hand, professional reviewers aren’t always giving in-depth reviews of the books I read or want to read. As well, there are way more customer reviewers out there; the law of averages alone suggests I’m more likely to share tastes with an amateur than a pro, many of whom fall into more similar social demographics to each other than to me.
A Frame Around Infinity 