Critical Critiques
by David Pyle
With the advent of online bookstores, e-books, and e-readers (Kindle, Nook, etc…) the proverbial literary barn door has swung wide to a vast new audience.
Personally, I love the Kindle Fire I received as a Christmas present. It was a stroke of marketing genius to give avid readers and students the ability to carry around an entire library in a pocket or purse sized device.
(I still purchase hard covers of my favorite authors)
As a result of these new toys, people who most likely haven’t turned a page in a good novel since high school or college have suddenly found themselves being force fed a glut of Novelry they otherwise wouldn’t have given a second glance.
To exacerbate the dilemma, more novels are being published now than in all of recorded history.
My point you ask?
Because of this, suddenly everyone has become self-ordained hyper-literate critics over the last year or so. Suddenly, even miraculously, these same people feel the ardent need to critique every single paragraph of every book they’ve pasted before their bleary eyes.
If you’ve purchased a book from any of the aforementioned outlets, then you have seen the “reader reviews”. Many of these negative page long expert reviews are simply a heated and biased opinion based on the reader’s personal preferences.
My request to my audience is that you favor the positive reviews lurking just below your proposed purchases.
I discovered just recently that had I allowed myself to be swayed by some of these gutting reviews I would have missed out on some fantastic tales, by some fantastic storytellers; even with (God forbid) grammatical errors.
As a published author, I know from personal experience that copy editors are only human and can mess up spelling and grammar, software can puke all over your meticulous formatting, and that there are unscrupulous publishers that will publish your raw work unedited.
As a matter of etiquette, any reviews found here on pentwist.com are chosen because I LIKED the book and believe my audience would enjoy reading a particular medium from a particular author.
Regrettably, I have been forced to give reviews of books in online book clubs simply because it was a requirement for receiving a pre-published review copy. Not all books, even well edited books are to my liking and for conscience sake, I have discontinued accepting review copies that require a written review.
However, this does not mean that an author I didn’t care for does not have an audience that will like the style or voice or the content of their published work. It simply means that I didn’t like it and therefore refuse to pass judgment.
Please Click Here to view a few personal favorite reads.
Or Click Here to download the list— (.doc format)
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