A few days ago an author mentioned two comments that struck my interest. Leaving said author anonymous unless he wishes to be named his comments were something along the lines of…
I have a blog! Give me a free copy of your book, I R reviewer. Um, no.
There will soon be more erotic reviewers than writers.
Both comments paraphrased of course, but the general idea is there. Now, interestingly it had never occurred to me that someone with a random blog, such as mine lets say, would have the audacity to ask for a free book giving the dubious offering of a review for however many people visit that site. Now, all publicity being good publicity in the realm of writing and authorship so even if the review is bad, the name and book are still getting Google hits; but wow, am I missing out on some hidden world of random reviewers? People not only do this, authors and publishers actually send them free books?
Seriously?
Which, of course that dove tails into the second comment regarding the plethora of erotica romance reviewers of late. Once again, I seem to be living under a rock because for the most part, I could never find more than one or two reviews for any particular m/m book I choose at the moment. A lot of it was that I happen to read a number of author backlists and reviews tend to concentrate on the newest and shiniest of releases. But even then, there were several I simply couldn’t find reviews on – at all, anywhere.
So thus began my search of trying to make a list of all the many review sites for romance, and since that list was omfg big, I’m going to narrow that down to particularly, m/m romance or erotica reviews. Why you ask? Because I’m curious and thus spent HOURS upon HOURS culminating in days, looking for this and the only way to make such a trivial, meaningless waste of time appropriate is to pretend it brings someone else a measure of entertainment, or saves them the time.
So let’s start with the big names that everyone goes to more for the social aspect and drama than reviews. These all have a focus on het romance over m/m and tend to have entertaining, but snarky reviews. Overall, I don’t really visit them for informative, insightful m/m book reviews.
Desert Island Keepers
*Now I put this in its own category because it’s all about romance with a considerable hefty portion devoted to m/m erotica and romance but its focus is heavily on author interviews and likes of contributors. If you look back for the past two months, there is not a single book review beyond an “I loved this book” very short gush which is entertaining but not an informative book review site. The individual contributors’ blogs lean towards het romance and again, I’m focusing on m/m.
So what about actual book review sites? Well, there are tons! Shall we?
Now all of these review tons of different m/m books, yet, here is where I’m going to get into trouble but I’m going to say it, there are less than a dozen reviewers between those massive review sites that offer thoughtful, provocative, informative reviews. Ok, don’t kill me now because that’s not to say the quality is bad, per se. But the majority of reviews from the above review sites are incredibly short, mostly a paragraph, commenting more on the basic feeling the books left the reviewer with than an actual review of the book.
Now before I’m flayed, I seriously challenge anyone to find more than 1 or 2 reviewers PER SITE that actually write complete reviews. Now that’s not to say reviews have to be so long you fall asleep during the middle of it or even that they have to be longer than a paragraph, but the review has to say something (IMO) more than you loved it or you hated it.
One of the reasons I wanted to work for Rainbow Reviews was the quality of their reviews. Sure they have their share of short and emotion reviewers, but they have several reviewers who write about a book with intelligence and insight (shout out to Emily, Carole, Marame and of course JM Snyder). Those are the type of reviews I personally consult when considering a book.
So with that problem established, I also tend to look at blog reviews so let’s go there for insightful and informative reviews:
The Good
Emerald Jaguar Thoughts
What am I reading?
The OK
*either due to short/emotional reviews or very occasional reviews but good sites
Kris ‘n Good Books
The Ginger Kid’s Den of Iniquity
So while several of the above sites all have reviewed the biggest new releases getting word of mouth, I again ask you.. what about the others? What about Rick Reed, who I have found all of maybe one informative review (thank you Wave)? And so on for other authors.
I don’t pretend I’m important nor do I pretend reviewing for my blog, Rainbow Reviews and Manic Readers makes me some sort of legitimate reviewer, nor does it any of the others listed either unfortunately. However, I’m still glad for those sites that continue to pump out their reviews into the nether. Maybe they know the secret to free books, but I shall pay my own way and call myself a fan of literature.
As for more reviewers than writers? Well, I think that is an easy argument – just as there are authors who publish less than award winning material, there are similar reviewers but I don’t think we’re in danger of being overrun just yet.
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So why is Uniquely Pleasurable not a good review site, in your opinion? All our team reviews are longer than a paragraph, and none of them are of the loved it/hate it variety – because I expect more from them.
As a reviewer for a rival site, you might want to think about whether you come across as partisan in your assessments. Especially a site which has more than a few of the very kind of reviews you say you don’t approve of.
Hey thanks!
Hey Kassa
I saw this post via Sarah’s and LB’s blogs and was very chuffed to think you included me with the likes of them and Jen B.
It’s always cool to get feedback like this so a big thanks to you for taking the time to prepare this great post, especially on such a topic as reviews which can be as contentious as the books themselves.. and then some. 🙂
Re: Hey thanks!
Thanks for the comment! I love your reviews not only on your site but on Wave’s. So it’s like double the fun :D.
Reviewers List
Thank you for this list! I had a feeling there were more of us m/m reviewers out there than met the eye, and I was hoping for way to find some of them. This is a big help. 🙂