I tried to read it today, and it was horrible. I kept cringing from the writing and the unbelievable characters. I stopped after twenty pages.
Yet this book averages four stars on Amazon! How can this be? One review says:
"This book could have been alot better if it shaved off about 250 pages.
I wasn't too pleased with this one."
Yet the reviewer still gave three stars! I've lost some faith in Amazon reviews after this. Perhaps the author somehow tapped into a readership who is eager to please and reluctant to criticize.
6 comments:
Maybe you just need to read more trashy books to normalize :)
Hmmm...I was going to say small sample size, but there were 23 reviews before yours. Maybe you should just chalk it up to others' bad taste.
I just read, what I (and the New York Times) thought was an exceptionally good book - The Places In Between - the author's account of walking (literally) across Afghanistan in Jan. 2002. Yet, I was astonished to see how polarized the reviews were on both Amazon and Good Reads. Either reviewers loved it or didn't get it - there was little middle ground. That's something I've rarely seen.
Did you add a review to bring the average down? If not, I guess that you're contributing to the issue. :)
If you find it awful then; rate it as awful. Doesnt matter how many stars others give it. And maybe if you add personal views of howcome you find it awful - this might substantiate your views - in fact i find commentaries more interesting than star ratings. :) I heard your talk in London about Lively - am impressed by your work. A literary review by you on any book maybe very interesting? Maybe on a very good book - why waste time writing on a bad book? ^^
This is another evidence of "popular taste".
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