Why Bad Reviews Shouldn’t Freak You Out
By: June Westerfield
Tags: Writing Life, Writing Tips, Books And Authors, Authors, Books

Why Bad Reviews Shouldn’t Freak You Out

Image by Perfecto_Capucine from Pixabay

I moved from Texas to Tennessee when I was 14 (way back in 1988). Doesn’t really seem like that drastic of a move does it? Both states are in the south, both are known for their “good ol’ boys”, and let’s face it, a lot of Tennesseans migrated down to Texas back in the day. It should have been an easy transition, right? Not so much. Here are a couple of the questions I was asked by classmates in my first few days.

1. Did you ride horses everywhere? Have you ever ridden in a car before? 2. Did you have electricity? 3. Have you ever watched TV?

And the list of weird questions goes on and on. Sadly, none of the questions were asked ironically. Apparently, they thought I’d lived in a John Wayne movie.

Those questions all came from teenagers back before the internet and Google, so we’ll excuse them. I think at least half of those kids grew up to know a bit more about the world than that. I hope. Yet, I am still amazed on almost a daily basis with the way people’s minds work.

A couple of years ago I was in the grocery store picking up some bottled water (don’t judge me, it was for my emergency/storm supply). There was an elderly lady and her teen granddaughter picking out water but being very particular and reading every label. I didn’t judge, I read labels on most of the stuff I buy as well, though not usually water. I reached for the brand that was on sale and the girl said, “Oh, no! Don’t buy that one. It’s from California.”

I pulled my hand back. Like I said, I don’t usually read the water labels. I assumed the women must be ecologically aware, and as I thought about it, I figured they were right. I mean isn’t California in a constant state of drought? Why are they sending their water out across the country? I started to look at other water, deciding I should be more mindful. But then, the situation changed completely. The older woman said, “Yes, you have no idea what they put in that water.”

WHAT? Do Californian’s put heroin in their water?

Then the young girl said, “Yeah, I’d never drink that. There’s no telling what it would do to your body.”

WHAT THE WHAT?

Did these people think California water contained some sort of magical goo-goo juice that would turn me gay? Or worse… into an actor? I just smiled, grabbed the on-sale California water (you know, just in case there was heroine in it), and pushed my buggy the hell off that aisle before I asked them if they’d been drinking heroine-water.

So why am I telling you these lovely stories about people I feel are odd as hell? Because I want to talk about perception and about how we see the world versus how other people do. It really and truly takes all kinds to make the world to go round & round. And you never can tell, just by looking at them, or by analyzing their demographics, how a person thinks.

For example, I dye my hair unnatural colors like purple, pink, and blue. When I go out I get a variety of responses from curled up noses and dirty looks to smiles and raving compliments. When I first started dying my hair I thought I’d be able to tell how particular people would respond just by looking at them, but I was wrong. Young, old, male, female, they all give me a variety of responses.

What does any of this have to do with getting a bad book review? Everything. The moral of all these stories is ‘people are weird’. All of us. We all think differently based on our own lives, experiences, and whatever notions were passed down to us by the people that shaped our lives. We don’t think the same way, so we aren’t all going to like or dislike the same things, or even like or dislike things for the same reasons. Sometimes a person’s reasons for something are going to seem whacko to you. But to them, their reasoning is solid.

You can’t please all of the people. Ever. You can’t even please all of the people who read your genre. Reviews for my books are, for the most part, raves. I get some of the most fabulous and articulate reviews saying how wonderful and strong my women are and how spectacular my world building is and how exciting my books are. Then there are those (only a couple, thank goodness) that call my characters arrogant, or sluts (yeah, that one hurt), and say my stories are boring (that hurt worse).

At first reviews that said bad things like that sent me into a hysterical tizzy of tears and doubts about my own self worth. And I just wanted to scream at them, “Shut up, you’re stupid! You know NOTHING!”

But then, I started thinking about the stories that I just told you, and I realized, their points were valid. Oh, not to ME… I think my books are fabulous and I thought the California water people were weirdos. And not to EVERYONE… lot’s of people think I’m fabulous. But to those individuals, their opinions make sense to them. And guess what? THAT’S OKAY! We are all entitled to our opinions, and they are all going to be different, because we ARE all different (thank {insert your preferred deity here}).

As long as the “OMG That was BRILLIANT” and the “that didn’t totally suck” reviews outnumber the “that stank worse than three-day old fish left out in the Texas heat” reviews, then I’ll keep writing. And SO SHOULD YOU.