Reading Reviews

Is it wise for writers to read reviews of their own books? Or is it simply a recipe for frustration and occasional rage, when the brilliance of one's efforts is ignored, and the reviewer displays a lamentable lack of enthusiasm, or even scorn? Writers invest a lot of time and effort in their work, and often a great deal of heartfelt emotion. So it's easy to become upset. And human nature means that bad reviews often make more of an impact than good reviews.

It's bound to be a purely personal matter for each writer as to the stance they take on reviews. My own attitude is influenced by the fact that I've been reviewing books for over 30 years, so I can see things from the reviewer's perspective as well as from the author's. As a writer, I'm interested in constructive reviews of my books, even if I don't agree with everything the reviewer says. We all make mistakes - critics as well as authors.

Of course, like everyone, I am very pleased when people say nice things about my books. And last week I was lucky enough to get two wonderful and very extensive reviews of two of my non-fiction works. The Invisible Event blog gave fantastic coverage to The Golden Age of Murder. I am still pinching myself about the fact that this book continues to sell well, even the hardback edition, which was published two and a half years ago.

And then the online library Interesting Literature discussed The Story of Classic Crime in 100 Books in depth, and in a way that again I found truly gratifying. And to see the book appear in Crimesquad's Christmas Top Ten (along with the Folio Society set for which I wrote an intro) was also delightful. 

What is especially satisfying is that both reviewers "got" what I was trying to do. And this is, to my mind, the key to reviewing. When one judges a book, it is best to judge it in the light of what the author's objectives were - not, or not mainly, by what the reviewer thinks the author's objectives should have been. Criticism that is sympathetic and constructive, and which strives not to be hurtful, is to my mind not just entirely proper, but well worth studying. One can learn from such criticism, in exactly the same way as one can learn from criticism of a first draft from a good editor. And anyway, you can't please all the people all of the time. If one sends a book out into the world, one has to be somewhat philosophical about the reaction, hard though that can be. Probably the worst scenario is for there to be no reaction at all!

Criticism that is unpleasantly expressed or reflects the reviewer's personal hang-ups (or vanity, or ignorance) is a waste of time, and not worth bothering with. And even the finest critics can sometimes err on the side of acerbity. I have huge admiration for both Dorothy L. Sayers and Julian Symons as critics, but occasionally I feel they overdid the brutality. Because they were people of great distinction, this must have caused quite a bit of hurt. I think that in later life Symons recognised this, and some (but not all) of his judgements mellowed. It was, in my opinion, a change for the better. In reviewing, as in life, a reasonable amount of tolerance is a very good thing.