It’s Monday. I actually don’t mind it today.
I published a couple books with some stories from my life. I realized they were all on the short side so I took the advice of a couple people and combined them all together, I called it “Moving Forward” and self published on Amazon. I had a couple people read them. Out of those people I had a couple positive reviews and then I saw on good reads I was rated 2 out of 5 by 2 other people. It made me feel really bad. That’s not a good rating at all. My most recent book, “Little me, Big World” was given 4 out of 5 by 2 people. That will stay up.
So I am trying to decide if I should take down my first books. My husband said they were interesting to him and he thinks I should keep them up. I don’t know. I’m trying to figure it out. When I wrote the books and then combined them to create one book with my stories, I was thrilled when I received an email from a man who said he enjoyed it and he liked the way I wrote. Then I see these 2 stars, twice and I am really questioning if I should keep this book up. I’m not going to take it down just yet. I am still thinking about it.
What would you do?
Moving forward 
That’s a really hard one, I am not sure from a professional point of view if a publisher may not consider your work if you have a bad reviews. However I saw a tweet from Anna Mazzola the other day that she’d checked out someone’s 1 star review on her (really great) novel and the reviewer had left a 1 star review on loads of novels. I loved her attitude: hey lady, maybe you don’t like novels…! Maybe your reviewer just doesn’t have good taste.
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I’d say leave it up for a while and maybe promote that book a bit to get some more traffic to it. It’s just two people out of potentially thousands that decided your book wasn’t for them, I’m sure more people will love it than not!
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This was such a fascinating post. I would like to think that I would leave my book up because I worked so hard on it, and it would seem like a waste if I took it down. However, I really like feeling supported, and I’m not sure if I could handle the hate. I think it would depend on the situation.
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As a self-published author, I can totally understand where you’re coming from, but remember you can’t be everyone’s cup of tea when there are billions of people. You worked hard, so keep it up!
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Girl! Keep it up. Every book gets a few bad reviews but don’t let this discourage you from something big.
Be proud od yourself. You can always edit and change it as you go and release updates. You did something most people dream of doing, including myself.
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I say leave it up. That’s just one review and there are millions of readers in the world. Don’t base your book by just one review. You’d be selling yourself short 💜
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This is something in which I worry about more often than not. I know this scares me too.
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You shouldn’t take it down just because of a couple of bad reviews. It’s your hard work. You’ve put your soul in it. So don’t be scared of some negative reviews. Those are there opinions not a reality!
Stay strong and keep writing!!
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There are always going to be negative people on your life. Don’t let them win. You know your books are great and that people like them. Keep them up. Be proud of your hard work. Don’t let negativity rule your world.
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I can understand where you are coming from but what one person things isn’t what everyone will think. The person who gave you a two star review just might not enjoy the genre or format of your book. That’s nothing against you! But someone who enjoys your format or your genre will rate you highly!
For example, I’m not the biggest fan of historical fiction so I will review it harder without knowing that I am.
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You should leave them up. Only two people didn’t think it was for them & you can’t please everyone. As someone else suggested, maybe promote them a bit & see how others respond.
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I’d leave it up. People won’t always like everything but it is usually more about them, Take the positive from it, they read it. Some people will never have that feeling.
Go get em girl! Don’t let those stars define a book that has touched someone else enough to contact you x
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Leave it up.
You can NEVER please anyone. That’s just how writing is. Some will love it and some will hate it.
But, changing the books because of those reviews would be throwing all the good reviews away. They loved it and you should NEVER just listen to the negative. And don’t let you be defined by the negative.
Try and look at some of these books.
Fifty shades of grey – 36% of the ratings is 3 stars or below
Anne franks diary – 9 %
Lord of the rings – 12 %
Everybody get bad ratings 🙂
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A good question. I would probably feel just like you do. Having said that, I think you should just leave the book up. You shouldn’t let other people decide how you feel about something, no matter how hard it can be. And you never know why they rated it 2 out 5, maybe it just wasn’t what they expected? And 2 out of 5 is frankly speaking not that bad. Keep it up 🙂
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I would hate to be in this situation because I know I would feel the same but don’t let 2 negative reviews put you off! I’m sure there will be plenty of other people who love reading it!
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The thing about books is that everyone has such different taste and one man’s trash is another man’s treasure! I agree with the person above who said try to promote it a bit more and get more reviews from the people you want to be reviewing it :). You should only take it down if you personally feel like it’s not the best of your ability.
MB | http://www.meaghan-bethany.blogspot.com
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no, because not everyone likes everything and that’s okay, but there’s always going to be somebody that does like your work!
FATIMAH • ROSEYGOLDBOX
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Definitely keep it up. You wrote it for “*you*”
They can think whatever they like but it’s “*your*” story
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Leave them up. You can’t please everybody.
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Not in 1 billion years LOL….I’d have to take everything down hahaha! When your presence expands, unhappy, fear-filled people publish negative reviews that have everything to do with their unhappiness, and nothing to do with your clarity and truth. Carry on.
Ryan
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