Reviews=Sales?

[Peg Herring]

Ah, that is the question. And the answer is, who knows? But as usual, I have a few words on the subject.

First, as I said yesterday, a good review gives a writer confidence. That's good in meeting people and presenting a book effectively. It's no longer just my sister who loves the book. I can say, "Library Journal says..."

Second, I've run into libraries who use reviews as a weeding tool. If a book isn't reviewed in one of the "Big 3", they won't consider it. Since Five Star markets mostly to libraries, HER HIGHNESS' good reviews are opening up my target market.

Third, in a world where at least 90,000 new books appear every year (depending on who's counting), anything that gets a title in front of the readers is helpful. Even a bad review could help if it mentions the title more than once!

And finally, a good review creates interest in the mind of the bookbuyer, gives a bit of detail to help him decide if the subject matter fits his interests, and provides that "well, somebody liked it" idea that so many of us need to move from holding a book in the bookstore and taking the book to our homes.

[Jon Loomis]

When my debut was reviewed in both the NYTBR and WaPo Bookworld on the same weekend, it went from something like 65,000 on Amazon to #540-something (#1 in books-mystery-procedurals). It sold out at Amazon, B&N.com, WalMart.com, etc., and ultimately at the warehouse--into a second (small) print run it went. So yeah--prominent reviews can sell some books. Even the library reviews can be important--there are something like 8,000 libraries buying books in this country. If you could somehow sell each of your books to all (or almost all) of them, you could string together a decent little career.

As for P&W--they like to look at my books disapprovingly over the tops of their half-glasses (worn on a string around their necks). But secretly they enjoy the naughty bits.

[robert walker]

Revuews definitely help at least one person-- the author! In most cases, reviews give the author some emotional cache and often a sense of accomplishment, especially when the reviewer "gets what you had wanted the reader to get" in crafting this title. For instance my last I wanted to convey a moonlighting sense working with a Noir sense or thread throughout Dead On and most who reviewed it and readers who wrote got it just fine; only the PW reviewer didn't get it, which I think says more about this anonymous reviewer than it does the book. People complain about Amazon reviews but next to that complaint, all I hear are complaints against PW as failing their books in this manner. And as with any review, the author has no recourse to make a correction or even a comment, so that part of reviews is a pain. But in the long run, authors like and want feedback; we want to know if we hit the mark or not--the target we set for ourselves.