The Book Cove

Every reader has different tastes. Shocking revelation. Reviewing is a bit of a different beast in that a good reviewer tries to keep personal feelings separate from the critique of quality of  writing. It's hard though, not to let your personal style preferences interfere with the evaluation of characters, plot, and sentence formation. I've explained before that this is part of the reason I use ratings. My rating shows book quality but may or may not strongly reflect my personal views on the book. For the most part, they do line up because I'm not too picky about style. If I can make it through the book and can comprehend what is going on, then I generally enjoy the read and feel that the quality was decent. Everyone has there own list of what is okay to let slide in a book and what is not. And as much as we try not to, sometimes there is the smallest detail or quirk that sets us off. The moment I notice the incorrect use of a word - we all make mistakes. But I think ...

" Is it fair to use a scale rating system?"  This is a common topic among those in the book world and I figured that I'd throw out my two cents on how and why I rate books. I don't think there is any right or wrong answer. What it comes down to is doing what you're most comfortable with. It seems like the general "pro" group consensus is that rating provides a reference point for readers while the "con" consensus group is that rating is so subjective that it loses its meaning. I agree with both points. When you look at sites that use rating systems (Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble), it's hard to tell whether or not you should trust the rating . Some fans will flood the sites with biased ratings to promote the book. Opponents then come in and mark down all of the good reviews while leaving one star ratings. With those sites, it's usually the 3 star ratings that I trust the most. I guess I figure that the reviewer found both goo...