Via Galleycat, literary critic Janice Harayda brings you the The Worst Negative Book Review Clichés, proving that book reviewers are often as unimaginative, if not more, than the authors they pan.
The top 5 are:
1. "cardboard characters"
2. "thin plot"
3. "cookie-cutter characters"
4. "the book falls apart at the end"
5. "I just didn't *care* about the characters."
You know, we're often advised not to respond to negative reviews. It never does any good, and can lead you to be accused of being an "author behaving badly" by the type of reviewer that regards authors as something akin to domestic employees, and who doesn't care for it when "the help" gets uppity.
But I think a simple link to Harayda's article might be apropos if some reviewer commits one of those cliches. What say you?
The top 5 are:
1. "cardboard characters"
2. "thin plot"
3. "cookie-cutter characters"
4. "the book falls apart at the end"
5. "I just didn't *care* about the characters."
You know, we're often advised not to respond to negative reviews. It never does any good, and can lead you to be accused of being an "author behaving badly" by the type of reviewer that regards authors as something akin to domestic employees, and who doesn't care for it when "the help" gets uppity.
But I think a simple link to Harayda's article might be apropos if some reviewer commits one of those cliches. What say you?
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