That I had yesterday, via Twitter, with the tremendously talented Julie Booker and equally talented Steven Beattie. I suppose it wasn't really a conversation -- more like one or two sentences -- but it centred around some interesting issues, and so I thought I'd discuss them in a little more detail here.
Yesterday, I came across this article, touting several Twitter tips for writers. I thought -- and still think -- that it's mostly a good list. I have issues with numbers 3 and 5, but that's only because they require Facebook, and as we all know, Amanda is still stubborn in her refusal of all things Facebook related. I'll be the first to say, of course, that my stubbornness is waning, and I contemplate going back on Facebook at least fifteen times a day. But on the whole I'm still wary of it, and I get irked when I see marketing tips that assume everyone in the world is plugged in to that blue and white social marketing machine.
However. This isn't actually a post about Facebook, believe it or not.
I liked the list, on the whole, and retweeted it to my Twitter peeps. Was immensely flattered with Ms. Booker retweeted it to her followers as well. And then Mr. Beattie chimed in and said this:
All sorts of thorny ethical problems with #7 on that list.
Number 7, as you'll see if you click the link above, says this: Use Google to find book reviewers who review the kind of thing you write. Ask them to review your books. If you have writing friends, ask them to do reviews for you and offer to do the same for them. Social means relationships.
The continuation of this Twitter conversation clarified certain issues: Steven had problems with the "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" type of thing that often happens between writers who might give a favourable review to one writer in exchange for favourable reviews of their own work. This I completely understand.
I have thorny ethical issues with this tip for reasons that are slightly the same, but also slightly different. I mean, I don't mind asking book reviewers to write reviews of my work -- that's what they like to do, and thus far, the book bloggers/book reviewers that I've come across have been tremendously nice people. If they can't, or would rather not, review my book, they've all had excellent reasons for doing so. And at the end of the day, of course, this is a business. It can get personal enough already, what with one baring their soul and all via the written word -- it doesn't make sense to make it MORE personal by being offended when someone doesn't want to review your book. That's all fine and dandy.
What I have issues/problems with, I suppose, is the idea of asking one's writerly friends to review one's own work. But I'm less concerned with the you-scratch-my-back mentality here than I am with the ... audacity, I guess, of asking friends to review my work in the first place. Don't get me wrong -- I would never intentionally enter into a back-scratching agreement. I won't trade good reviews of my friends in exchange for good reviews of my work. As it happens, I have given some quite glowing reviews of work that fellow friends have written -- but this, I firmly believe, has to do solely with the quality of the work. These friends have not written reviews of my work in return. In fact, of the reviews of my work that exist on the Internet (there aren't many, but I do hope this will change in the future), precious few of them have been written by people I know.
I suppose this boils down to confidence, in the end. One of the things that makes me long for a traditional publisher is the fact that they do shoulder some of the marketing portion of publishing a book -- they contact reviewers, and hustle authors for book blurbs and reviews, and I'd so much rather have a publisher do that than me. Because I can't help but think: why should so-and-so want to review or blurb my book? Why would they possible care about it? Who am I to think that my work could possibly be good enough to warrant a blurb or review in the first place?
This is why I cringe at the thought of explicitly asking friends -- people I know, people I encounter on a semi-daily basis -- to review my work. I know it probably doesn't make sense, especially when I am comparatively more comfortable with asking complete strangers this very thing. But when it comes to people I know, I get all queasy and weird about it. I feel like I'm being pushy. I'd so much rather have a friend request to read my work, or review it, than use the opportunity of a friendship to push a review on someone.
But. As Julie pointed out, this business runs on relationships. The literary world is entirely about connection -- who knows who, who knows what, who you know that can help you know what's what, etc. Publishers have been fostering relationships like this on a grand scale for decades. So if one is, at the moment, at least, creating a series of relationships on their own as a self-published writer, it just makes sense to put these relationships to practical publishing use. To dive in and ask for reviews regardless of whether one is offering a review in return or not. I understand that, objectively.
Subjectively, though, I can't do it. And I think it would be a good year's assignment for me, to think and wonder and try out examples of doing just this. A year and a half ago, my agent suggested that I ask my good friend, the lovely Deborah Willis, to have a look at my novel. Possibly with the aim of getting a blurb. Possibly not. I have yet to email her and ask her to look at it -- this is partly due to the fact that the novel has undergone some significant revisions in the meantime, but also due to the fact that I'm just a big 'fraidy-cat, at the end of the day. What if she thinks I'm being pushy? What if she stops being my friend?
I can be more than a little ridiculous. I know.
But we've all seen those over-zealous authors (particularly the self-published ones, it's true) flogging their work at the front of the bookstore. We've all heard the stories of those writers who get their friends to write good reviews in order to move one up on the Amazon ladder. I don't want to be one of those people! I want my work to be judged on the basis of the work alone, and not because I'm the friend of so-and-so who just happens to have a book contract, or some clout when it comes to reviews.
Or am I just being a sissy? Do I need to toughen up my publishing backbone, folks? What do you think?
Yesterday, I came across this article, touting several Twitter tips for writers. I thought -- and still think -- that it's mostly a good list. I have issues with numbers 3 and 5, but that's only because they require Facebook, and as we all know, Amanda is still stubborn in her refusal of all things Facebook related. I'll be the first to say, of course, that my stubbornness is waning, and I contemplate going back on Facebook at least fifteen times a day. But on the whole I'm still wary of it, and I get irked when I see marketing tips that assume everyone in the world is plugged in to that blue and white social marketing machine.
However. This isn't actually a post about Facebook, believe it or not.
I liked the list, on the whole, and retweeted it to my Twitter peeps. Was immensely flattered with Ms. Booker retweeted it to her followers as well. And then Mr. Beattie chimed in and said this:
All sorts of thorny ethical problems with #7 on that list.
Number 7, as you'll see if you click the link above, says this: Use Google to find book reviewers who review the kind of thing you write. Ask them to review your books. If you have writing friends, ask them to do reviews for you and offer to do the same for them. Social means relationships.
The continuation of this Twitter conversation clarified certain issues: Steven had problems with the "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" type of thing that often happens between writers who might give a favourable review to one writer in exchange for favourable reviews of their own work. This I completely understand.
I have thorny ethical issues with this tip for reasons that are slightly the same, but also slightly different. I mean, I don't mind asking book reviewers to write reviews of my work -- that's what they like to do, and thus far, the book bloggers/book reviewers that I've come across have been tremendously nice people. If they can't, or would rather not, review my book, they've all had excellent reasons for doing so. And at the end of the day, of course, this is a business. It can get personal enough already, what with one baring their soul and all via the written word -- it doesn't make sense to make it MORE personal by being offended when someone doesn't want to review your book. That's all fine and dandy.
What I have issues/problems with, I suppose, is the idea of asking one's writerly friends to review one's own work. But I'm less concerned with the you-scratch-my-back mentality here than I am with the ... audacity, I guess, of asking friends to review my work in the first place. Don't get me wrong -- I would never intentionally enter into a back-scratching agreement. I won't trade good reviews of my friends in exchange for good reviews of my work. As it happens, I have given some quite glowing reviews of work that fellow friends have written -- but this, I firmly believe, has to do solely with the quality of the work. These friends have not written reviews of my work in return. In fact, of the reviews of my work that exist on the Internet (there aren't many, but I do hope this will change in the future), precious few of them have been written by people I know.
I suppose this boils down to confidence, in the end. One of the things that makes me long for a traditional publisher is the fact that they do shoulder some of the marketing portion of publishing a book -- they contact reviewers, and hustle authors for book blurbs and reviews, and I'd so much rather have a publisher do that than me. Because I can't help but think: why should so-and-so want to review or blurb my book? Why would they possible care about it? Who am I to think that my work could possibly be good enough to warrant a blurb or review in the first place?
This is why I cringe at the thought of explicitly asking friends -- people I know, people I encounter on a semi-daily basis -- to review my work. I know it probably doesn't make sense, especially when I am comparatively more comfortable with asking complete strangers this very thing. But when it comes to people I know, I get all queasy and weird about it. I feel like I'm being pushy. I'd so much rather have a friend request to read my work, or review it, than use the opportunity of a friendship to push a review on someone.
But. As Julie pointed out, this business runs on relationships. The literary world is entirely about connection -- who knows who, who knows what, who you know that can help you know what's what, etc. Publishers have been fostering relationships like this on a grand scale for decades. So if one is, at the moment, at least, creating a series of relationships on their own as a self-published writer, it just makes sense to put these relationships to practical publishing use. To dive in and ask for reviews regardless of whether one is offering a review in return or not. I understand that, objectively.
Subjectively, though, I can't do it. And I think it would be a good year's assignment for me, to think and wonder and try out examples of doing just this. A year and a half ago, my agent suggested that I ask my good friend, the lovely Deborah Willis, to have a look at my novel. Possibly with the aim of getting a blurb. Possibly not. I have yet to email her and ask her to look at it -- this is partly due to the fact that the novel has undergone some significant revisions in the meantime, but also due to the fact that I'm just a big 'fraidy-cat, at the end of the day. What if she thinks I'm being pushy? What if she stops being my friend?
I can be more than a little ridiculous. I know.
But we've all seen those over-zealous authors (particularly the self-published ones, it's true) flogging their work at the front of the bookstore. We've all heard the stories of those writers who get their friends to write good reviews in order to move one up on the Amazon ladder. I don't want to be one of those people! I want my work to be judged on the basis of the work alone, and not because I'm the friend of so-and-so who just happens to have a book contract, or some clout when it comes to reviews.
Or am I just being a sissy? Do I need to toughen up my publishing backbone, folks? What do you think?
Yes, you're being a sissy. I get requests from authors to read their books all the time, and I never think badly of them. They're just trying to get out there, and after all the hard work they've put into their book, why not?
ReplyDeleteI have only one caveat as a reviewer: I'm going to say what I really think. So are you asking me for a good review or a review?
I guess what bothers me more is when people follow me or want to friend me on Facebook when they haven't spoken to me once and it's obvious they just want me to to review a book they've written. Worse is when they contact me and call me Bella, which, as I explain on my about page, which they obviously didn't read but which others do before they contact me, is my middle name.
Back to the point: there's nothing wrong in asking someone if they'll do you the favour of reading and/or reviewing your book. The worst they can say is no, and they likely won't think you're too pushy. What you're doing is natural and expected. It's your approach that counts.
Yes you're being a sissy and you know it! You know it one hundred percent. I can't believe you haven't send Debbie your book! I just assumed that somewhere in all the writing and revising you must have sent it to her. Didn't you send her Instructions? Why not this one?
ReplyDeleteI think you also overestimate what a publisher will do for you. I believe it's commonplace for the author to get the blurbs, if possible. And the publisher will be happy if you help get reviews as well.
In fact, in a successful marketing campaign, you would have to send your book out. You would just have to. Or an email to find out if the reviewer is interested. The publisher will probably not have the time to send all of those emails; the marketing department will probably send out copies to the big papers/reviewers, but all the bloggers? Probably not.
OKAY OKAY, ladies. Point taken.
ReplyDeleteConsider me de-sissified. Next time you go into Chapters, odds are it'll be me shoving my book at you when you walk in the door ... :)
Thanks for the discussion, Amanda. I agree with Steph. There's a difference between asking for a review and asking for a good review. But I like your idea of the 'Chapters Greeters.' Hi, my name's Amanda, and I'd like to direct you to this book right over here. We could both do it until we get found out and have to go for a latte at Starbucks.
ReplyDeleteJulie, that sounds like a fabulous idea. I'm in if you are! After all, if the worst that comes out of it is a latte at Starbucks -- what's to lose? :)
ReplyDelete