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Sparkle (1)
People who choose to blog about books don't tend to see themselves as "product review" bloggers, but in many ways we are. I don't see requesting and accepting new and not-yet-published books for "review consideration" as all that different from trying a new juice flavor or educational toy or chair or household appliance and writing about one's experience with it; books are products, too.
However, book bloggers are covering ground that still gets a decent amount of attention from traditional and professional media (yes, seriously, even if it's declined over the last decade), and at times our qualifications - and even our right - to review, discuss, and recommend books gets called into question. Sometimes it happens very publicly, and sometimes it comes from the source that makes book blogging possible - an author.
That happened not too long ago - not for the first time, and probably not for the last - and book bloggers sat up and asked the author who leveled the charge:
Hey! Who are you calling “unprofessional?”
The question was directed at a romance novelist who responded to a couple of reviews that didn’t please her with a post on her blog, Authors Helping Authors, advising her fellow writers to steer clear of “unprofessionals” who “set themselves up as reviewers” and probably “never wrote anything themselves other than a grocery list.”
I’m not linking to it myself, because plenty of others already have and I’d rather link to some of them instead.
Pam was quick to fire back:
“It would seem to me that any author who sets their self up to ‘help other authors’ would know that the rule of thumb is especially dealing with us peon bloggers is: you don’t respond to our reviews...All of us do this kind of book promotion in our spare time and for free. For you to throw around the words ‘unprofessional’ and ‘trashy’ and then link to them is unfair and elitist (note: the links were later removed from the original post, and comments were closed)...Are you saying that bloggers who just willy nilly set themselves up can’t work very hard at their craft? I know how many hours I spend. I also know I can’t write a book, or a poem, or a haiku.”
Karen (a/k/a Sassymonkey) responded with a “Dear Author” letter:
“I realize that you believe I am an 'unprofessional reviewer' due to fact that I do not review for the New York Times. I write about books, and my opinion of books I’ve read, here in my personal book blog — a blog that was never intended to be your personal marketing ground...I’m sure that you’ve never uttered anything that was not nice at all on the internet. Oh wait! You just wrote a post calling all book bloggers unprofessional and slammed the entire romance genre by calling it predictable. Good job! Way to take your own advice!...I shall, however, thank you for writing what you did. It allows me to make sure that I never read or purchase your books.”
Amanda primarily reviews books by dead white guys, but she wondered:
“THING ONE- HOW IMPORTANT ARE BOOK BLOGGERS ANYWAY? Important enough that this author solicited a review and pitched a tantrum when the review wasn't glowing. Important enough that many of us- myself included, though my niche is limited- receive numerous review requests from authors and publishers alike...THING TWO: WHAT DO WE OWE THE AUTHOR? As a classics blogger, I say we owe authors just this: not changing their work, an issue that has been discussed at length since the Huck Finn censorship deal. Aside from that? Jack squat.”
Jeanne proposed a simple solution to the “problem” of unprofessional reviewing:
“It's nothing new, but let's go over it again for Sylvia's benefit. Bloggers, if you don't want to shill for publishers, go to the library and buy your own books, for the most part. If you find publishers who will continue to send you advance review copies even when you review some of them negatively, stick with them. Authors, if you want honest reviews, look around and find some bloggers whose views you generally agree with and whose taste you trust.”
And Kim had some cautionary words for both sides:
“First, I think
