Renegging: Bad reviews and bad ideas

Maybe I’m more haunted by the Zeitgeist than I think. While I was mulling over my post on negative reviews this weekend, writers stung by bad reviews were bouncing all over the internet.

For instance, a guy who bragged about his cunning plan to give a one-star review to the woman who had the temerity to give him a two-star review on Amazon. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work.

(I link to the Making Light entry because the reviews themselves have been expunged. Also I don’t want to drive traffic to the guy’s site. He doesn’t even have lists of things!)

A more productive response to a bad review (not just a negative review) appeared at Salon.com around the time of the King slapfest and I was remiss in not mentioning it before. (This came up in the comments section, along with other good points by Charles Stross and others.)

In passing: Making Light is one of the few places on the internet where reading the comments section is not a waste of time, due to their ruthless and humane moderation policy.

About JE

James Enge is the author of the World-Fantasy-Award-nominated novel Blood of Ambrose (Pyr, April 2009). His latest book is The Wide World's End. His short fiction has appeared in Black Gate, Tales from the Magician's Skull, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and elsewhere.
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