I used to think being a book reviewer was easy. You eat a book. You make an opinion. You write it down. You award self by buying a small galaxy. TA DA. Done.
Well. Sometimes it’s more complicated than that. And I don’t just mean because purchasing galaxies is expensive.
SOME BOOKS JUST AREN’T EASY TO RATE.
They don’t neatly slot into one of the five star ratings most reviewers use. Your thoughts on the book are perplexing. Head and heart are warring! IT’S A DIFFICULT RELATIONSHIP.
When I’m reading, I mentally preparing myself for a review. (Do you do this?) I go into most books with an open mind, expecting and hoping for at least a 4-star read. By 100-pages I have a good idea of the rating, but I don’t “officially” decide, of course, until I finish the book. But my brain is mentally sliding the star-rating around the WHOLE TIME I’m reading.
But when I hit that last page and still don’t have a single clue what to rate it? It frustrates me.
So I want to talk about some books that took me nine billion hours to decide the rating.
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FRAGMENTS was a particularly hard book to sort my feelings over, because it’s a sequel and I loved PARTIALS. I had such fond memories of Partials that I couldn’t really believe I loathed the sequel. But I did. It was so freakishly boring. Until those last 100-pages where they all started shooting each other instead of sitting around eating tinned noodles.* I ended up rating it 3-stars because…ugh. BOREDOM.
* I actually can’t remember if they ate tinned noodles at all. I’m pretty sure they just sat around, sans noodles, which is why the book clearly was so boring.
I spent half the time reading MORE THAN THIS going:
It’s like a science-fiction mixed with dystopian and sprinkled with contemporary characters — also with the most confusing and open ending ever. I hardly knew what to think the whole time! BUT. I chose to go heart over head for this one (pfft, I almost always do) and gave it 4-stars because I liked it. Even if I was confused.
But I’m almost always confused when books are open to interpretation and don’t make anything definite. I’m possibly Castiel. I’m rather angelic, don’t you think?*
* Unless your answer to this question is “YES YOU ARE, CAIT” then don’t speak.
I basically hated everyone in FALLING INTO PLACE. The main character is self centred and awful and the side characters aren’t much better. But, maybe that was the point?! Still…it’s hard to read a book and not care if the characters poke themselves in the eye with a spork because they’re just so unpleasant…
But the writing was good! The short sentences were awesome! The present tense/mostly-third-person is my favourite! GAH. It wriggled 4-stars out of me in the end.
To put it bluntly, EGG AND SPOON is boring. It drags oooon and oooon and ooooooooon like a disagreeable zucchini.* Plus it’s 5 million pages, or, well, 475 pages which is basically the same as 5 million. I felt the book was amazing (from a distance) but I was ridiculously happy to finish it. So easy low star rating, right? RIGHT?
WRONG.
It was actually notoriously funny. I snorted at just about everything Baba Yaga, the infamous Russian witch, said…plus I quite related to her. She’s not fond of people and she calls them weird names instead of their actual names, beecuase she’s hip. In a Russian Tsarist sort of way.**
“Shut up, you two,” said Miss Yaga. “I’m starting to remember why I prefer life in my own private hermitage.”
* Don’t question this statement.
** It’s best if you don’t question this statement either. In fact. Don’t question anything I say. Or else you’ll get the incorrect suspicion that NOTHING I SAY MAKES SENSE.
Now I do talk about THE SIN EATER’S DAUGHTER quite a lot, actually. Possibly because I’m ridiculously upset at the lac
k of actual eating of sin in this book. The title is SUCH A LIE. Yet, here I am, always talking about it…why? Because the ending really threw me on my head. And I LIKE that! Hence the book is actually stuck in my brain despite being a) disappointing, b) lacking of delicious food, c) lacking of sin, too, actually, and d) ridiculously boring.
It should be 2-stars because I ground my teeth all through the beginning. But that ending? It wiggled 3-stars from me because I was impressed with the plot twist, although it took me HOURS to decide that. Hours, I tell you!
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So how do I decide on a rating when I’m completely stuck? Usually I peel back all my frustrations and complex and tantrumy feelings and think, “Did I enjoy it? YAY or NAY?” And then I rate accordingly. Which often sucks, because I’ll look back at books and think, “That was rubbish, why did I rate it so high?” because I’ve whacked the star rating on because of a fleeting feeling.
Sometimes I also dream of half star ratings.
Sometimes I just yell “I QUIT” to my minions and leave them to come rate and review because I’m 1000% done with the entire matter. This is a good reason to have minions, yes?
STAR RATINGS ARE A TRIAL! It isn’t as easy as I used to think. See what suffering I go through to be a book reviewer? Geesh. Let no one declare being a bookworm is easy.
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Well, I only review like maybe 10% of the books I read, but I do at least log a Goodreads rating. So it’s not on my mind ALL the time, but I do mentally notch it down or lift it up when it disappoints/surprises me. Like, recently I read Memoirs of a Geisha, and the beginning had such fabulous worldbuilding that even though the mental rating kept slipping, it still ended up with 5 stars. (I’m still fretting whether I should go back and change it, but I’d only be able to bear to give it 4 stars.) And argh, the lack of half-star ratings will be the death of me someday.
P.S.: When’s Beautiful People coming this month? I’m going to see if I can jump in on it 😉
(We were shockingly late with BP this month, weren’t we?! It’s live now!)
But, yes, erk, I’m tempted to go back and change ratings a lot, but at the same time — It’s HARD. I feel like it’s cheating somehow. >_< But I did change my Fragments rating, I think. WE VOTE FOR HALF STARS TO BE USED ON ALL THE WEBSITES. *nods* Someone make it happen.
Rating is haaard man. Books I think are easy to rate are more the exception than the rule for me, tbh. What I find the most difficult to decide between is a four star rating or a five star rating. I want to save five star ratings for the really REALLY good ones, but sometimes it breaks my heart to give a book 4 stars instead of 5 stars because I feel I “need to be strict”. (it makes no sense, I know).
What I also struggle with is all the different types of books. Sometimes I read a book that’s AMAZING and definitely five stars because it has depth, it has intellectual insights and all kinds of smart stuff that blew my mind and was fun to read about at the same time. But then there are books that were SO much fun to read, but less “literary” (ugh, I hate that word in this context) and then I find it difficult to give that book 5 stars as well, even though I enjoyed it just as much as the first one.
Oh, ratings. They’re the bane of our existence, aren’t they?! I’m still waiting for the day Goodreads gives us half stars ;_;
Also: YAY FOR CUTE ANGEL GIFS.
And it’s hard when you read a really good book that you enjoyed…and then you read THE BEST BOOK THE UNIVERSE HAS EVER SEEN FALJKSDA OMG!! FEELS! And like they both get 5-stars, but it’s such a different 5-stars. Gah. #bookwormproblems
EXACTLY.
Love this topic! I am in a constant struggle with rating books. Especially if the ending is eh. I am a believer in the half star because I find I am constantly in between ratings so why not. And I am also always thinking about the rating throughout the book -sliding it from one number to another. I just read Because You’ll Never Meet Me and I was so eh the first half of the book. It was fine but then the second half I was really into and enjoyed a lot. So when it is a tale of two halves I find it hard to rate as well.
HAHA OMG I AM COMPLETELY OPPOSITE TO YOU WITH BECAUSE YOU’LL NEVER MEET ME. And for some reason that just makes me giggle. XD I kind of love how books can evoke different loves/hates in different people. Books are awesome. That is all. BUT YES. I kind of am seriously tempted to start using half star ratings…it’d make life easier, that’s for sure.
THIS IS EXACTLY WHY I DON’T RATE BOOKS ANYMORE. It’s just too hard! And because people kept misinterpreting my ratings . . . well, I just decided it was not worth it. I thought that words always speak louder than a rating, and it worked for me and my blog the best. ^_^
WELL GO YOU, THEN. I don’t think I could ever ditch my star-ratings completely, but omg, they give me angst. XD
I feel ya. I struggle with this all the time (#firstworldproblems), because it’s just so hard to sum up all your complex thoughts about a book in a simple star rating. I often look back at my ratings and think what vile spirit possessed me when I decided to give THAT four stars!? I definitely think about the rating when I read; it just happens. I don’t decide until I’ve finished it though, because a grand finale can definitely add a star here or there. I think my main problem is that I rate some books for reading enjoyment and some books more objectively, so I might give two books the same rating, but it means something COMPLETELY different. It’s complicated. 😀
I liked Fragments, but a friend of mine gave up on the series because she thought it was too slow. I totally get it, but for some reason it didn’t bother me too much. A book I had trouble rating is Eleanor and Park. I thought some things were very well done and others …not so much. In retrospect it kind of makes me feel uncomfortable and I don’t even know why, but I think I gave it four stars because the writing drew me in and I finished it in a day. Also City of Heavenly Fire, which I’m not sure actually deserves the five stars I gave it in terms of writing and story, BUT I just enjoyed it too much to care.
I had problems with Eleanor and Park too! AND I FEEL SO BAD ABOUT IT. everyone raaaves about that book, but I wasn’t sold, like, at all. Gah. I still gave it 4-stars because I love the writing style though. (Fangirl, tho?! OMG THAT IS MY FAVOURITE BOOK EVER.) I gave CoHF 5-stars as well just because I love the characters and the series AND ZOMG THAT ENDING. XD It wasn’t a perfect book, but pshhht. I rate on feels. xD
I definitely struggle to rate books sometimes! I can’t actually remember any specific books to be honest, but there’s always the hmmm three or four stars dilemma. It’s like, do I REALLY like this book, or do I just normally like it? haha
I think of what to rate books while reading- say 10 pages in, I might think “if it keeps going like this, it’s a four star”, or as soon as there’s a predictable twist, I might think “well that dropped it a star rating”. I never had this mentality until I started a book blog! Now everything is rated out of 5 or out of 10 haha
HAHA I LOVE THAT. “Is my love DEEP or just average.” XD That is me totally, too. I have a mental star-rating conversation with myself too most of the time while I’m reading. xD
This is so true, I am brand new to book reviewing on my blog (also new) and sometimes the rating is so easy but then other times like you say, there are characters you hated so much you wanted to dive into the book and give them a sharp slap but is that because they were so well written and we were meant to hate them? Therefore meaning that the author has done a great job in characterising them!
I also struggle with obvious endings – I am the kind of reader that doesn’t like to know the ending of a story by the half way point, it makes me want to put it down and go ‘ok I know the ending now bored already’ so if a book has a really obvious ending I do struggle with that rating even if the ending is written well. I tend to emply half stars at this point!
I find it especially difficult if I’m reading a book everyone else loved and I really don’t get it, partly because I sit there thinking is it just me?!
x
It’s true! I try to remind myself when I HATE a character that…well…I’m still feeling something, right?! The author has still written it WELL. XD
I hate it when an ending changes my entire view of the book – for good OR bad! It’s just frustrating because how do I rate it?!!
Love those Castiel gifs!:)
Rating is super hard! Sometimes I know by instinct what I am going to rate a book, sometimes I really can’t decide.And this is why I don’t rate books in my blog.
And another problem is the fact that sometimes my opinion of a book changes with time, and the rating may drop. So I just gave up doing it altogether.
CASTIEL IS THE BEST. Well. Nearly the best. 😉
Ahhh, not rating is so tempting sometimes. xD I tend to keep doing it though because I like the little overview, but arghhh it’s so hard sometimes!!
I just suffered this with The Thickety because I rate books based on how well I think they fulfill expectations within both their classification and genre. It was the first time I have not given a star rating at all because if I rated it as the Middle Grade it was classified as, it would have been 2.5 because it was far too gruesome and violent for 7-12 year olds. However, I could not bring myself to do it because as an adult I loved it, and if it had been a YA (which it could easly have been because making the MC older would not have changed the story one iota), I would have rated it 4 stars on Goodreads and 4.5 on my blog! I felt the same as you about The Sin Eater’s Daughter. What in the world are tinned noodles?
OMG I HEAR YA WITH THE THICKETY. That book disturbed me. Reading it I was constantly thinking, “I couldn’t have handled this when I was 12”. lol But at the same time it was freaky and addictive. :O
Tinned noodles?! I DON’T KNOW. Noodles in a tin! You don’t have them in America?!
Like spaghetti in red sauce in a can? If not, no we don’t have tinned noodles. :/
It’s pretty easy for me to rate books…when it comes to the actual reviewing–that’s where I have problems. This is usually how it goes:
Me: “i enjoyed that book! I should review it”
Me: “….how do I right a review?”
Me: “never mind, I’ll just rate it five stars.”
With star ratings….weeeell, since i haven’t been reading much lately, and I DNFed the two books I really wasn’t liking, most of the stuff I read I really enjoy. But then sometimes, like with the Winner’s Curse, I really enjoyed reading the book, but some of the content made me hesitate rate it five stars…so, it got four stars. Oh, and when I was reading Steelheart, I was sure it would be a four-star book; I liked the book, concept, but one of the characters rubbed me wrong way. She just started out sooooo typical!!!! But then she developed I began to like her and then the ending was mind-blowingly awesome (well, or the plot twists would have been if I hadn’t peaked ahead….woops…) so i rated it five stars!!!
So yeah, sometimes it’s a leeetle hard to rate books, but I just have a hard time writing reviews.
YES. THIS. Exactly! I totally understand this whooooole comment, because that’s how I feel! How do we rate books when some parts are freakishly fantastic and other parts are as dry as sundried tomato? IT IS PAIN, BASICALLY. We ought to reward ourselves with cake, or something, for our bookwormish efforts.
YESSSS I do this all the time. When I’m reading a book I have a star rating in my head. Surprisingly it usually stays the same. BUT I SECOND-GUESS MYSELF A LOT ONCE I’VE FINISHED. One of the most common times is when I know the author on Twitter or something and I’m like to myself, “Please like this book, please like this book.” IT’S SO HARD TO GIVE A BOOK A LOW RATING IF YOU EVEN SORT-OF KNOW THEM ON TWITTER. *sobs* The trials of a book blogger.
WE JUST NEED BE MORE CONFIDENT, DON’T WE? Gah. But I second guess a lot. I feel bad if it’s too low…or then maybe it’s too high because the book sucked. OR MAYBE I JUST DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT I’M DOING. <--- Real answer right there. Awk, I cannot even read books by people I know. It's too stressful.
I liked More Than This too! (But I gave it 3 stars, not that it makes much of a difference). Anyway, awesome post as always! I enjoyed reading it. 🙂 You should try Ness’ other books, though, like The Knife of Never Letting Go (it’s infinitely better) or Monster Calls (best cancer book…best ANYTHING book).
I HAVE READ BOTH OF THOSE AND I LOVE THEM. I’m like a total Patrick Ness convert now. xD I loved A Monster Calls so so much…awk. It gave me a lot of feels for an MG. And I’ve read his latest book, The Rest of Us Just Live Here and IT IS EVEN MORE INCREDIBLE THAN ANYTHING ELSE HE’S WRITTEN SO FJADKLSA PATRICK GENIUS NESS.
I feel this struggle after every book. Generally, if I like a book, I just give it 4 stars, even if my feelings are, “Well, this wasn’t so bad.” I’ve been trying to hold back with 5 stars unless I REALLY love the book. I would be so very happy if Goodreads and Amazon could start utilizing half stars. I’m a huge believer in the half-star.
Somebody needs to whisper in Amazon/Goodread’s ear that we neeeeeed half stars.
I can totally relate to this post. Giving a star rating is so difficult for me that I don’t bother using them on my blog. I just post the review.
HA! I don’t blame you. Sounds like a tempting idea. 😉
Tell me about it–galaxies are soooo expensive nowadays. And the quality just isn’t what it used to be. Grrr.
Yes! I have struggled with rating books before (not that I’ve written too many reviews–I’m just getting started. But I have more reviews to write, and I’m still waffling). I took hours to decide whether to give JOSHUA AND THE LIGHTNING ROAD by Donna Galanti three or four stars. Eventually I decided on three stars, and I’m happy with that rating. But it was so hard.
Usually I decide my rating about fifty pages in, but it’s definitely open to change. The book has to wow me, though. Right now I’m reading the worst book ever and I decided basically on the first page that it was going to be one star. I’m interested to see if that will change, but right now I’m not making uber fast progress because I can’t stand to look at the thing.
We don’t even get as many stars as usual. AND more black holes, I mean, seriously. WHAT IS THE UNIVERSE COMING TOO? I blame it on global warming. I just do. Don’t question this.
RATING IS HARD. I think we ought to reward ourselves with waffles for doing the best we can with rating. and YES. You just reminded me of waffles and now I’m having a craving. #thanksfornothingLiz
I have this issue all the time! Especially if a book is at best mediocre most of the way through, then BAM amazing ending. Then I normally end up rating the book way higher than it deserves because I’m still riding the high I got from the ending, instead of considering the book as a whole. I can’t even count the number of times I’ve looked at my old star ratings on goodreads and been so confused as to why I gave a book the rating I did. Although I do think about how much I’m enjoying the book as I’m reading it, so I suppose I am technically thinking about rating it, I can drastically change my opinion within the last few chapters. 4 star ratings are definitely the ones I give the most because usually when I enjoy a book that’s my go to if it didn’t wow me. Loved the post!
AGH. Sucky books with amazing endings are the worst because…HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO RATE THAT?!!
I always know when I have one of these when I finish a book and go “Meh”. It was an okay way to spend the afternoon but I can’t really decide where it falls on the scale. Typically it gets a rating 2.5-3.5 and I call it a day. I either review them and explain why I had trouble rating it or I don’t review it at all. I tend to have my best reviews with extremes. It was either a 4.5-5 star or it was a 0-2 star. Anything in the middle I have trouble with.
I review on the half-star level. I just mark it as a whole number on Amazon or Goodreads. I usually qualify it on those reviews by saying “I know it says 3 Stars but it was better than that. It’s not a 4 either so I hold it at 3.5”. I round up or down depending on where it falls on the whole point spectrum. If it was more like a 3 then down it goes.
Great post!
Middle ground is HARD. I used to never rate anything 3-stars. I either loved it or hated it. XD And noooow?! I feel like I’m constantly in the 3-star territory, so either I’m just really picky for books I’d normally rate 4. Or else I’m too scared to hate books. heh. WHO CAN KNOW.
This is precisely why I do half star ratings. And also why I occasionally give quarter star ratings… FIVE ISN’T ENOUGH OPTIONS, CAIT.
I basically need to start dividing up my star ratings mathematically so I can have a star rating of 3.14 and be NERDY AND ALSO PI AND PIE. It’s gonna happen now.
Rating books is oddly hard. You’d expect it to be easy, but it isn’t.
I actually find it hardest to rate the books that I didn’t like. I worry that my rating isn’t fair, or that I should be rating it higher but I’m not because I don’t like it…it’s a bit nerve wracking, to be honest.
EXACTLY!! That’s completely how I feel! I mean how hard can a few little stars be?! Evidently ridiculously hard. -_-
Book blogging and reading + reviewing books sound simple to people at first, but it’s not as easy as they think. I agree on you with that, Cait 😛 Like you, I mentally prepare a short review of the book while I’m reading it. More so, I even decide a star-rating in the middle of the book haha. But of course, it changes by the time I finish the thiing. 🙂 I’m surprised to hear you didn’t like the characters in Falling in Place! I’ve been wanting to read that for so long. But I’m glad you still liked the writing. I’ll be looking forward to that at least.
Great post!!! <3
Falling into Place is still totally worth the read!! Everyone’s just kind of…catty and awful, you know?! But the character development is GOLDEN.
I HAVE FOUND A TWIN IN YOU, CAIT. I do the mental ratings too! Upon the first chapter I have a small idea of how I’ll rate the book, then as each chapter ends I slide my rating up and down. 🙂 I totally get having trouble with ratings!
Like with The Wicked Will Rise. The humor was not for me AT ALL and that actually made me really annoyed, but for once I chose head over heart (I rarely do that) and gave it 3.5 stars because THE WORLD BUILDING WAS SO FANTASTIC.
And for a recent review, Hidden Huntress, I gave it 3.5 despite basically nothing much happening in the story, but my EMOTIONS WERE THERE. Gah!
WE CLEARLY ARE BOOKISH RATING TWINS, AIMEE. IT IS OBVIOUS. I kind of like sliding the rating everywhere as I read, like “Whoop, stupidness here, down to a 3 you go” and “BAH. I loved that sentence. NOW YOU BE 4.” >_> I never claimed sanity. JUST REMEMBER THAT. Ahem. But omigosh, I did so love the Dorothy Must Die world too. Incredibleness. XD yet so creepy. Although I still like Splintered better. *whispers* Because Morpheus, naturally.
I rate like 98% by emotions. XD
I think you must be a mind reader. Seriously, I literally just finished Shiver and I don’t know whether to rate it three or four stars. On the one hand, it had Isabel. And Sam. And Grace. And it was really cute. And those last 100 pages, oh my God, those last 100 pages (fact: when the last 100 pages blow me away, I tend to put the rating up a star – case in point: Blue Lily, Lily Blue and Gallagher Girls #4). On the other, I think they rushed into their relationship and, at first, I was a little creeped out. I mean, she has a crush on a wolf. Also, the wolf is stalking her. But then Grace and Sam were so adorable that I kind of forgot about that and – ARGH! DECISIONS ARE HARD!
I think about the rating all the time whilst I read, mainly based on how I feel whilst I’m reading more than anything else. Feelings are probably my major factor.
OH I UNDERSTAND THIS. I actually gave Shiver 3-stars the first time I read it because I thought it was a tad boring. BUT SAM. OMG MY LITTLE SAM AND GRACE IS ADORABLE AND ISABELLE BECOMES ONE OF MY FAVOURITEST THINGS EVER. *hyperventilates quietly* So it got 4-stars from me when I reread it. xD
Yeah, book ratings can be tricky, but I don’t rate books all that often so I guess I don’t really think about how to rate them until I get to the place where I want to be. The main way I rate books for myself is a simple yes or no question: “Would I want to read this again?” Usually that makes it easier for me to decide how I feel about a book overall. (Although, I think you mentioned you’re not a rereader, so that system might not work for everyone.)
Books that I feel bad about not wanting to read again tend to be the ones where I don’t answer the question. SHATTER ME by Taraheh Mafi is one that I didn’t really like, but everyone else seems to like it so much. Another was SPY HIGH by AJ Butcher—I really like spies and the cleverness he used, but I also wasn’t that impressed with the story. Same with RISE OF THE SHADOW STEALERS by Daniel Ingram, or FENCES by August Wilson. It’s not that they completely sucked, not at all! It’s just that I’m not confident that this book was worth my time in the first place, because I’m not confident that it would be worth spending time on again.
I tend to officially “decide” on the yes/no rating when I’m recording my books in my reading log, but I think I’m able to tell, usually within the first few chapters. Plot twists and emotional agony do nothing for me—if you’ve written a brilliant book from the start, then I’ll know, and I will remember it. If you didn’t, then I’ll remember it too. And that could be to your detriment.
Ah yes, that wouldn’t work for me because I never reread but still adore certain books. But GAH, sometimes I love a book and I still wouldn’t want to reread it…like I think Skulduggery Pleasant is hilarious and wonderful and I ADORE them but I don’t have any intention of ever rereading. xD So I’m a bit odd like that. heh.
I get a good idea of if I like the book within the first few chapters too. *nods* Although books CAN go rapidly down hill for me. XD
First, I approve of the Castiel GIFs 😀
But yesssss! I always struggle to rate books, most the time if I’m confused about a book it gets 3 stars, I don’t hate it but I don’t love it either, so safe betting is 3.
A book that got me all confused what All My Friends Are Superheroes, I just didn’t know what to think after reading that.
Juyey xx
http://www.juyey.com
Castiel oh the incredibly adorable little ANGELIC DARLING. Ahem. I have a lot of Castiel feels, yes, yes I do. xD
3-stars is always such a disappointment territory for me. >_< I'd rather be passionately in love or hate of a book then feel MEH, you know?! XD
OMG i definitely think about my review/rating while reading books! It can be a little annoying at times because I want to be able to just ENJOY the book you know. Ah wells, that’s the sacrifice we make for book blogging :’)
THE PAIN IS REAL. And we sacrifice so much, omg, I agree. We ought to be award small shiny stickers or at least copious amounts of chocolate.
Ugh, yes! For example, These Broken Stars. I went back probably 5 times on Goodreads and alternated between 2 stars and 3 stars. I’m sure I looked like a crazy person by changing my rating so many times!
But we have to get these ratings as right as possible, eh?! IT’S CRUCIAL TO BOOKWORM SANITY.
Oh I entirely agree!! STAR RATINGS ARE TORTURE. They annoy me so much that most of the time, I just give up and don’t use them. I DO use them on GR, but when I do they’re kind of all over the place there anyway, and so don’t mean anything to me.
I mean, how are we supposed to express our enjoyment of a book with FIVE PIDDLY RANKINGS? It doesn’t account for things like entertainment-enjoyment vs. writerly-skill-enjoyment vs. plot-twist-enjoyment. GAH
WE NEED LIKE 10 MILLION STARS TO ACCURATELY RATE BOOKS, TBH. Okay. Maybe not 10 million. 9 million. That’s far more realistic of me, right?
Hey, I’d just go for decimal places and rate something as a 3.78421562 stars. Because that’s also totally realistic.
IT IS. WE CAN RATE IT LIKE PI TOO THEN. That would make us epic nerds and also pie.
I’ve changed my rating system a few times because I couldn’t get my ratings to accurately reflect how I felt about certain books. Even now, the system isn’t perfect.
I totally think about ratings before I finish a book… especially if I’m not enjoying myself. I start writing the review (complete with cathartic snark) in my head. Sometimes that’s the only way I can push myself through a bad book.
I usually don’t have a particularly hard time rating books, generally speaking. I gave More Than This a really low rating because it was open-ended and stupid and I was totally expecting… well, “more than this”. And if there had been more (like I was hoping there would be), I might have rated it higher. But that one was actually a pretty easy one for me to rate. Hmmm… I think The 57 Lives of Alex Wayfare was kind of hard to rate. I changed my rating system after reading it because I had no way to account for pure enjoyment. There were historical inaccuracies, which bugged me, but I also couldn’t stop thinking about the book (and that ending… aaack!), so I felt like my 3.5-star rating might’ve been a little low.
I’m always reviewing (probably snarkily) in my head while I read. XD heeh. I usually forget all my one-liners of awesome by the time I review though. I COULD take notes, but bah. I’m also lazy. heeh.
Gah, i completely understand where you’re coming from. Sometimes, when I read the first book in a series and really love it, its FIVE STARS! but then I read the sequel and its EVEN BETTER but then I cannot express that through my rating because it would be five stars again. 🙁 I guess that’s what the reviews are for, eh, Cait? And I LOVED Falling Into Place, even if the characters were snobbish, I ended up giving it four stars as well. We be book sister <3
It is SO unfair of books when the sequel is even better. Sheesh, they’re difficult on purpose to us, I swear. SO MUCH FRUSTRATION FOR THIS HOBBY WE LOVE. *hi fives for bookish sisterness*
YES, YES I DO STRUGGLE TO RATE BOOKS. It’s especially hard when you look back at books that have the same star rating and think “wow, well, OK, those are clearly NOT on the same level.” I think I’m a bit 5-star-happy … the sight of that empty star on the end makes me feel bad for giving 4! But then I look at some of the books I’ve 5-starred and think really? How can this possibly be in the same place as my favourite, best-books-of-ever? Sometimes I dream of a special 6-star rating for your very favourites. But then, I’d probably start abusing that, too …
I’m REALLY stingy with my 5-stars these days…but then, gah, some books get a 5-star just because I’m in a good mood. lol I’M JUST SO INCONSISTENT WITH MY RATINGS. It’s half my battle, tbh. *facepalm*
Oh yes, the struggle is real! I’m the kind of person that hates rating things halfway, so what I usually do is round whatever decimaled number I get. It often works for me, although I tend to feel bad that it’s not entirely accurate. Oh well.
I don’t usually think of the rating while I’m reading the book unless I’m really loving it and hoping it ends as a five star read. (Which isn’t very often.) But I like to give every book the benefit of the doubt and just enjoy the experience, you know?
I WISH I could turn off my brain and just enjoy a book while I’m reading…but I’m always analysing and I forget to enjoy just the reading-ness. (That’s totally a word. Yes it is.) WELL SOMETIMES. Not all the time thankgoodness. xD
I laughed out loud at this post! It’s so true! Throughout each book I read I’m always deciding what I will rate it and my opinion always changes. Then when I finish it I find loads of reasons to love certain books and go to rate it a 5 star, then think hang on it wasn’t that good. Also, when I hate a book I end up rating it higher because of other factors such as characters I loved even if I hated the overall story. Mehhh! You definitely summed it all up perfectly!
Angelica x
YAYYYY. *dances like an asparagus* I’m glad it made you laugh. 😉 This struggle is SUPER real though, I mean GAWSH. We bookworms go through a lot with star ratings. I mostly always rate on feelings, but when my feelings are conflicted WHAT DO I DO?!!!
Ughhhh rating books is the worst! I’m a strangely decisive person with my opinion on books so usually I can think of what I think of it by the end, but there’s curveballs every so often that make NO. DANG. SENSE. WHAT DO I RATE THE THING. If I find myself super conflicted, that usually means it’s getting three stars from me, I guess. *shrugs* But I feel your pain.
I always feel so bad about 3-stars because it’s like “meh” rating territory for me. BUT DARN THE BOOKS THAT AREN’T CONSISTENT. Either be awful or great…none of this so-hard-to-rate-business. XDXD
Ugh, I relate to this post so much!! Sometimes there’s a book that I KNOW is good on some level, and someone else would surely like it, yet I have some personal reason to not like it. Other times the writing is good but I hate the characters, or (as you say) the whole book is boring except for one or two parts. Star ratings are hard! (And I hate that GR doesn’t use a half-star rating system!)
We really need to riot and demand these half stars from goodreads! WE MUST.
Ahh I so agree with this! It’s so hard sometimes. That’s one reason why I enjoy reading the actual content of reviews though – because it give the reviewer a chance to describe exactly what about the book made them rate it that way. I feel like you can’t just take the star rating and go with it, that’s just the overall feelings. To me, the important part WHY! It’s also so much pressure sometimes – like if everyone else likes a book and you’re not really digging it. I feel pressured to give the book more stars, but I try to just stick with my guns and explain WHY i feel that way in my reviews. It’s a hard life 😛
IT IS A HARD LIFE. All we can do is eat chocolate and buy small planets and hope for the best, amirite? I think star ratings NEED reviews to go with them and explain things. xD
Falling Into Place was a book I was also confused about. Beautiful writing, but really unlikable characters. I gave it 3 stars, but I’m actually willing to reread it to see if I like it more. The Sin Eater’s Daughter was also a book that made me scratch my head. I gave it 3 stars, too, but I bounced between a 3 and a 4 for a while… 4 only because I really really wanted to like it because it was my most anticipated book of the year, so I felt heartbroken about giving it the dreaded 3 stars.
I think everyone on Goodreads dreams of half star ratings. And to answer your finishing questions: I struggle to rate books sometimes. It really depends on the book, and then they are usually the books that are a tad confusing or just good but not quite good enough. (I am a notorious back-and-forth rater on Goodreads. I actually only rate books on Goodreads; I keep my blog ratings-free because who has time to go back and edit individual posts?!) And I sometimes think about rating a book while I’m reading it, but I also sometimes don’t. It really depends.
I FEEL THE SAME ABOUT SIN EATER. Well. I was actually going to give it 2 because I was so furious it wasn’t as good as I hoped. And then the ending was like 4-star worthy. SO GAH. I just settled in the middle and feel endlessly sad about that.
When is Goodreads going to answer our pleas?!
I rate as I read AND often compose my written review in my head as I go–it can get very distracting when I do that so I try not to do it often. Most of the time I start writing the review in my head when I’m not really loving the book because it isn’t keeping my attention. I think it actually makes me rate books harder (ie more critically) when I do this because I pick out every detail that annoys me.
I use a 5 star system so all books start in the middle at 3. If I easily read the book (ie I read it within 3 days and didn’t want to read/do nothing else) it gets 4. If I simply couldn’t put it down (ie finished in one day) and it interfered with my everyday life (ex. studying for exams), automatic 5. If the characters annoyed me to no end and/or the plot was ridiculous, 2. If I enacted my 50 page rule to stop reading or continued to read and wondered “why am I still reading this?!” 1 star.
I find it hard that Goodreads uses a full star system. I wish it did half stars because some books aren’t at that 4 but they are more than a 3. I feel like I have a lot of inflated Goodreads ratings because of this.
OMG I DO THAT TOO!!! I seriously am having an interior monologue with myself while I read a book…and yes, if it’s an excellent book I often forget to do it because I get lost in its awesomeness. :’)
I think your rating system is really interesting!! I basically rate 100% on whether I enjoyed the book or not, although my over-analysing brain can sometimes stop me really enjoying it. Boo. I need to work on shutting down the inner editor when I read sometimes. xD
Ugh, overactive brains are the worst! Because as soon as you know you are overthinking you start overthinking about overthinking…a slippery slope 😛
I just find that my rating system helps me keep track of things on Goodreads–plus I really like definitive answers when it comes to books! I think it’s the scientist in me that likes have a solid conclusion about things. It really completes my reading experience and helps me remember (because I read a lot of series and often read the sequels really far apart which sucks because my memory is awful).
I have to admit that is probably why I don’t star reviews on my blog. I do give them a star rating on Goodreads but it’s just so hard. I also feel that because I read so many books that loads of people have recommended to me I’m usually in the four-star area anyways.
IT IS HARD. But I’m too addicted to them to stop using them. I think star-ratings are like a really nice overview, somehow? But yes. 4-stars is solidly wonderful.
I don’t rate books on my blog, but I do on Goodreads. I have trouble working out what I’m thinking with 2 or 3 star ratings. Ideally, it would be 1-hated it, 2-didn’t like it, 3-meh, it was ok, 4-liked it, 5-loved it! But I struggle between 2 and 3! I don’t know which to go for sometimes. It’s frustrating!
I don’t know what I would do if I rated books for my blog. As it is, with my 5 stars, I’m “THIS BOOK WAS AMAZING! FIVE STARS!” But then think, “But so-and-so was better… so what now?” In which case, I decide to just rate a book on its own merits, rather than comparing ratings, lol.
But I rate at the end. Lol.
THAT IS HOW I RATE TOO!! Most people have 3-stars as “good” but for me it’s just “MEH”. I really have no strong feelings about it at all when it’s 3-stars. I tend to rate a lot of books 3-stars these days, though, because I kind of liked it, but it kiiinda had a lot of problems. >.> I think I’m too picky!!
This post kind of makes me want to cry. Ratings are hard. These are important life decisions, okay?
I do often think about ratings while reading books. My current audiobook, for example, was a solid 5, but I just got to the DRAMA/SOMETHING HAS TO GO WRONG part, and I’m so stressed out that I have no idea how it’s going to end up or what the final rating will be. And then do I judge it by the first 75%, which I loved, or the last 25%, which is going to take 5 years off my life?
My ratings are all over the place. Sometimes I rate a book highly because it was legitimately a good, well-written book. Sometimes a book gets 5 stars because it made me FEEL so much (whether happy or not), even if it’s not *technically* the “best” book from a critical perspective. I always look back at books and wonder why I rated them either so high or so low. It doesn’t help that my memory is awful. I sometimes think about going through Goodreads and adjusting all my ratings, but then I remember I have over 1000 books on there and promptly do anything else.
My point is, though I do love rating things, my ratings probably don’t tell an outsider much about the book. I’m slowly starting to add tiny written reviews to Goodreads, but I don’t think anyone reads them. This is not the first step in me starting my own blog, so don’t get any ideas. 😉
BAH. I always rate books on feeling. IT’S THE EASIEST WAY. I don’t even care of a book is “technically” not perfectly written…if I love it and I love the characters than — FIVE STARS AND ALL THE CAKE. Best yet, if it actually rips out my heart. haha. Why do I rate it high for that? Omg. I have problems.
There there, but don’t cry. *hands you bucket and mop* Although these totally ARE important life decisions. Planets depend on us rating books right.
And my memory is awful too. I THINK WE ARE LIKE SISTERS IN THIS MATTER, MARAIA.
No blog ever? *pouts*
I won’t say never, but right now I can barely keep up with reading and commenting on OTHER people’s blogs! HOW DO YOU DO IT? TEACH ME YOUR MAGIC. (Seriously, you’re like this super magical Cath-like being in my brain. Um. Sorry if that’s weird.)
I read to feel, so it makes sense that I would rate based on said feels. Including the heart-ripping-out feels, which tear us apart but always draw us in for more. We readers really are gluttons for punishment. I don’t think we get enough credit. 🙂
“Hey, guess what, I finished a really great book today! It was about….um….well, there was this one girl…and she did this thing….with some other cool people….”
BEING COMPARED TO CATH IS NOT WEIRD. IT MAKES ME LIKE 395370 TIMES MORE AWESOME, DEFINITELY. I ACCEPT IT. I have clones. Come now! A clone for blogging…one for commenting…one for sleeping. Wait. Okay, um. We have clone problems sometimes. Anyway.
We definitely don’t get enough credit. There should be mini award sessions for bookworms for all we go through for the sake of fictional characters.
Rating books sounds so hard…
I get what you mean. Once I had a book that I had to review for this magazine company, and it was so hard to review it, because it was so boring, yet it was still written well, and I admired the characters!
ERGH. Those books are the worst when they have super awesome parts and super awful parts. It’s just like sitting there tearing your hair and saying, “BUT I DON’T KNOW WHAT I THINK….!!” XD
I personally do not have this problem too often but when I do it is soo soo soooooo infuriating when it comes to writing my review! A couple of years ago I started reading More Than This and I just couldn’t do it because I just HAD to know what the hell was going on!
YOU NEVER GET ANSWERS FROM MORE THAN THIS. I’m still a little bit peeved about it, but at the same time I weirdly just liked that book. :O It’s Patrick Ness. I swear he’s some sort of word wizard and just makes me like his books regardless of if they make sense. HEHE.
I always have problem rating novellas. Fracture Me I just marked it read and left it at that. its an up and down process for me.
I think I’ve left a few books unrated, like one I DNF’d but do plan to attempt again one day. ONE DAY.
It’s so hard to rate books! Sometimes on Goodreads, I’ll add a little review that says my true rating is 3 1/2 stars or something similar. I don’t usually give my ratings a second thought until I see another book that I gave the same rating. For example, I rated both books 3 stars, but I definitely liked one better than the other, but not as much as this other 4 star book. ACK! It can get complicated.
I think we can all agree that Goodreads needs to make half stars a thing.
YES. That is why I fail so hard at this sometimes. I’ll read a slew of 3-stars, but not all of them are the same amount of mehnesss SO HOW DO I RATE IT. *longs passionately after half stars* I mean, I could just use half stars, but it bothers me because Goodreads/Amazon don’t. When they catch up and fix that my life will be infinitely better.
YES to this post.
I found it really hard to rate ACOTAR, I loved the retelling and the romance but there are huge flaws that bothered me. I wanted to give it five stars, but the flaws were annoying. I also agree with you about Falling Into Place, none of the characters were likeable but the story was amazing. I gave it the same rating as well, wonderful post!
AHhh, I felt like that with ACOTAR. For me, though, it was more I was super bored with the romance and the beginning, but the creepiness of the ending was like 5-star worthy. SO HARD TO RATE. And Falling Into Place…gah. That book messed with me, but I’m glad you liked it in the end too. 😉
I need star ratings. When a reviewer doesn’t give stars, it’s really hard for me to think about if I want it or not [or how high it belongs on my TBR]
For me, I usually go with my first instinct and only change if I really have second thoughts. Usually, I’m pretty good at choosing a rating only because I use other books as relatives to what it means to be ‘three stars” or what constitutes as “one star.” however, ratings can be really arbitrary so you shouldn’t think too hard on it, Cait!
I really like star-ratings. I know they mean different things to different reviewers, but it’s like a basic IDEA of how much they liked/disliked a book. I NEED IT.
when I glimpsed the title of this post, for some reason I read “Hating” instead of “Rating” LOL I was like, “of course hating books can be ridiculously hard!” But then I saw the real title. XD
But I agree–I have a hard time rating anything! Especially things like movies, because sometimes I can hate a movie, but rewatch it a month later and really like it!–or vise versa. It’s like “NO. I DON’T WANT TO MAKE A DEFINITIVE STATEMENT ABOUT THIS, I’LL LOOK SILLY LATER.” Or something like that. 😛
HAHA. YES. I’m hating on books here. XD Omg, but too true! Movies are so hard. I was actually so bored watching a movie once…and then I kept rewatching it (for some insane reason) and now it’s a favourite. What is even going on with my brain? WHO COULD KNOW.
Originally, when first rating a book, I generally don’t have a problem. But in the months later, I’ll change my mind a lot. With The Miniaturist, I started off with rating it 3/5, this has now slowly dropped to 1/5 since January because with time I find myself hating the book more and more
Five star book are also a problem. I’ve not given a single book 5/5 in 2015, when there probably are some 5* books I’ve read but I’ve grown exceptionally picky. I do have a general idea of what I’m going to rate a book around the midpoint, but that usually changes.
I do that too!! It depends on how I feel about the book in retrospect, right?! Some books I find I love a lot more as they just sit on my shelves and moulder in my brain. BUT OTHER’S I JUST HATE MORE AND MORE.
I’ve grown pretty picky too, so I understand that struggle. :'(
I’m totally with you with changing my mind months later, but usually I see books more favorably after time has passed.
Ah, Cait, the struggle is REAL. I cannot decide, ever. I think about it all the way through, and then when I am done, and inevitably weeks later when I eventually write the review. It is HARD. I mean, sometimes, I KNOW what a book is going to be rated, or at least, in the ballpark. But then there are some that I have virtually no significant feelings on either way. OR they weren’t BAD, I liked them, I didn’t LOVVVE them, but I can’t really point out what I didn’t like. Those pretty much go in the 3.5 star category, because I don’t know what else to do with them.
OH WE MUST COMFORT EACH OTHER IN THIS DIFFICULTNESS. *offers you chocolate…then eats it* I pretty much am only 100% certain when I go to rate a book 5-stars. Because I figure, if I’m dubious about it being 5-stars then it doesn’t deserve to be. XD
I review slightly more than half of the books I read, and I rate and write a few thoughts for them all on goodreads. So I understand the struggle. I just read A Wicked Thing, and the character had no personality for a third of the book and then I liked her… so I’m going to give it four stars- I think. Another one that was hard was 5 to 1 by Holly Bodger, which was also difficult to rate because really great writing and shoddy world building. Other ones that have been confusing for my small brain recently are The Heir by Keira Cass and the Storyspinner by Becky Wallace, because there were a lot of flaws despite an enjoyable story. I definitely judge a book by it’s first few chapters, but I rarely DNF (and it’s mostly because library books are due and they weren’t good enough to renew) Once I’ve finished the book I have a definite idea of what the rating is though, usually.
Ohh, LUCKY YOU if you know the rating as soon as you’ve finished. XD I am jealous. I like to review everything I read (obsessive? Yup. Me.) and I usually review like 3 minutes after I finish the book. SO YEAH. Maybe if I let the book sit in my brain for a bit more to work out my feelings!? That might help!
When you said you buy a galaxy at the top I thought that you meant the chocolate bar… foolish me.
Ratings are so hard, especially when I’m confused and not entirely sure what my rating should be. I always, always seem to go for a higher rating, either because some good happened at the end or I thought the writing was quite good despite hating the book. But then I look back and wish I’d given the book a lower rating. But I like rating a book because in some ways it gives clarity to the review and you know when it stands.
PFFT. WHY WOULD I BUY A MERE CHOCOLATE BAR? I’M ATTEMPTING TO OWN THE WORLD.
I agree, though! I like putting on ratings and I could never do away with them, even though I get really confused as to what to rate things. XD I think it’s like a really nice overview of one’s view of the book.
You’ve replaced my favourite Stick with coffee beans. I shall avenge you Stick *shakes first in rage*
I based my reviews on how entertaining I’ve found the book, and tend to only review the ones I’ve enjoyed (three stars and up). I don’t know how much value I put in a star rating personally, I think it’s just a quick reference to how good a book is overall, but I still prefer to read an entire review to see what worked, or didn’t for the reader. I do struggle though, and realised that I need to give it that star rating as soon as I can after finishing. That initial reaction to a book is what I go on, because after a few days you could feel differently and have time to compare it to other books as well.
The star rating is purely for me in most cases, but I think that’s what readers take notice of and certainly authors. I’ve always wanted to abolish star ratings on my blog, and I think you might have just given me the push I needed. Awesome post smushie <3
Viva la Stick!
I’M SORRY, STICK. I’M SORRY IT DIDN’T WORK OUT BETWEEN US. *sobs* I really out to take a permanent mascot. Perhaps a leaf or a pebble?
I like the star-ratings because I’m lazy and it gives me this quick gist of where the review is going. *nods* But I rely on the reviews heavily because WHY DID IT GET THAT RATING? One must know or explode. But omg, star ratings cause me some angst.
I feel your pain. It makes it even harder when I feel like I go through phases where I either rate higher or lower and I realize that my mood or a slump can totally affect a rating – which feels unfair. But ratings are subjective, so it’s pretty much impossible for that not to happen, you know. I do use half stars, but it’s still REALLY hard!
ERK YES! I do that too and I feel so bad. Like if I’d read Such-And-Such-Book at a different time, would I have liked it better?!! WHO CAN KNOW.
I do the same, when I am readign I mentally prepare for the review. I have a feel fo the rating, like you I go in hoping for at least a 4 star, maybe that’s why those 3 stars still feel disapointing. And then in my head I change up things. if something I really like happens or realy don’t like, I think of how I will sya that in my review. Nothing is set in stone until I finish though.
I did give Fragments a 4 star I think, but I think that’s mainly because I had a lot of time to read back then and got a huge chunk read in one day. i do agree with you the pace is way too slow.
For me rating is mostly based on feeling, it’s hard to explain. So it’s based on what I like and don’t, but also a feel of how much I enjoyed it and whether I had to struggle throguh parts or not. Sometimes I have to write my review to get a good idea of what I feel and then I just go with it and rate the book.
I always really really hope a book is at least 4-stars. xD And then as it gradually sinks I get more frustrated and grumpy. WHA. Fragments really made me cry. And I liked Ruins even less, unfortunately. BUT I love the authors serial killer series, so at least there’s that. XD RATING ON FEELINGS FTW I SAY.
I’m exactly like you in my approach to reviewing books. First of all, I do try to go into a book with an open mind and hope for a 4 star or better rating. There are a few books that I think will probably be a 2 or 3 but I still remain open minded and I’ve been surprised. As I read, I have a rating in my mind and I definitely don’t decide until I’m done. Many times I have said to my husband or friend “Oh, I’m reading this book and I think it’s at a 3 right now.” But that can change by anything, especially an ending. A horrible ending will destroy a book for me but something interesting in the ending can drag my rating up.
I too have rated books higher than I think I should have. I enjoyed it at the time but, thinking about it late, I’m like “What was I thinking? That book was mediocre.” I have less of that happening now that I have a blog because I think about my ratings a lot more than when I was just sticking a star up on Goodreads.
There are some books that are just so hard to review. There are the books with a great idea and characters but that sucked in the writing department. Or a beautifully written book that had some serious flaws. I also have a hard time rating a book when I really didn’t like it because I want to be as unbiased as possible and show both sides, but I can’t find much good to say.
I have started going half-stars on my blog. I rate everything on Goodreads, which obviously doesn’t have half-stars, so I’ll normally round up or down on there. Being able to throw in a half-star is kinda life saving for me. It really helps me get my review where I want it to be. There’s just some books that don’t deserve to be as low as a 2 but weren’t good enough to be a 3. Or were fantastic but not blow-you-mind worthy of a full 5 stars.
It’s REALLY hard rating books when they excel in some aspects, and suck in others. xD It’s just like “WHICH DIRECTION DO I TAKE THIS?!!” and lots of anguish and fretting. *nods* The struggle is real. We bookworms go through a LOT.
I’m absolutely terrible at rating and reviewing things. If I read or watched a book or movie that was absolutely AMAZING, I want to write a review. But then when I start writing my brain just goes asdkdllw. The same thing goes for if a movie or book was really bad. I am trying to get better at this though.
I just let it go and afjldksa all I want because sometimes IT’S THE ONLY WAY TO SUM UP FEELINGS.
I feel your pain Cait – sometimes narrowing a book down to just that one rating can be so difficult. More Than This was one of those novels which was simply…strange. I didn’t really know how to rate it because it was so different and I couldn’t even figure out how I actually felt about it because the writing was good, but the story itself incomparable to anything I had read before. Sometimes I think about “hmm…this is heading towards a 4” or “I’m not sure if I like this more than a 3”, but really it’s only final after I’ve turned the last page and really thought about it. Great discussion as always!
It was SUCH a difficult one!! I mean, it’s been, what? 2 years since I read it? But I still love it and STILL look back on it and think “What even happened in that book?!” haha.
I love this topic so much. When I start a book, I definitely read with a mind for reviewing. Like I’ll make mental notes (which I tend to later forget) of what parts I want to talk about most in a review and what parts I liked or didn’t like most. I don’t generally keep a star rating in mind though. But once I’ve finished a book and I find myself clicking the “I’m finished” button on Goodreads and those stars pop up, I’m just like ‘well crap, now what?’. What I find most difficult about starred ratings is deciding what I’m ratings based off of. Like what if the writing is beautiful and definitely a 5 star but the characters are annoying or the world building isn’t great? Do I add it all up and take the average sum of the stars? That’s way too much math for my English major brain. I ran into this problem when I finished TFIOS. I loved John Green’s writing but Hazel and Augustus annoyed me more often than they didn’t. All in all, there’s a reason why I use half stars on my blog. It just makes things slightly easier. =P
– Jazzie @ The Book Dancer
HA ME TOO WITH THE MENTAL NOTES! I make so many of them and…forget everything by the time I get to review. I mean, I could make notes, but BAH. I’m not that ambitious of a bookworm. XD I totally concur with the “well crap, now what” feeling. That is me and Goodreads-star-ratings like 87% of the time.
One time I was so confused about how to rate a book that I actually gave it TWO star ratings: 2 stars for the first bit 4 stars and the last bit 2 stars because the beginning was so good, but it suddenly became urgh.
The beginning was so good that I couldn’t bear to give it only 2 stars, but the ending was so bad I couldn’t give the whole thing 3.
Thankfully that’s only happened once.
But I do often have times when I find it difficult to rate books…and that’s when I write reviews…to explain my unsureness of the rating.
I always have a hard time not only rating books, but also reviewing them. I don’t want the review to be so long as to put my readers to sleep, but then, how do I decide what exactly to say if I can’t just mindlessly spew my thoughts on a page (I’m not very good at that anyway)? How do I accurately portray what is going on in my busy little brain?
And yes, I try not to, but while I’m reading I often think, “oh, I should remember to include this very important detail in my review, and I should write it exactly like this…” or I decide it’s a five-star book and then immediately remember all those little bits scattered throughout that annoyed me to no end (or those four long chapters that bored me to sleep) and realize that it is, in fact, a four-star book like 90% of the books I review, so I can’t give yet another book four stars, because someone’s bound to notice that there’s a pattern and wonder why I always give books the same rating. (That sentence was a tad long. Sorry.)
I have such a hard time rating some books! The worst is when you review and rate one and then talk about it later and think “maybe I liked this more/less than I thought..” The things that stick with you should be the things that get the rating, but they never are when you review after reading right away. And I DO pre-plan my reviews, thanks for asking! If only by noting things in my head and writing sentences about them. Like I haven’t finished A Court of Thorns and Roses but I already know what I’m going to say about Lucien and Tam and Feyre’s relationship.
Also, hard reviews suck. But, like every review feels like a hard review for me since I’m so new to this D:
Ugh I KNOW! I am extremely bad at making my mind up about rating books, that’s why I included half-stars in my reviews because I just can’t decide on anything really but at least that allows me more freedom to give books accurate ratings because half-stars are just needed in life, ya know? I don’t ever think about what rating I’m going to give a book as I’m reading, only once I’ve finished do I think about that! 😀
Oh, I definitely struggle with rating books! I especially love when books have great endings, but I think that has a negative effect on my rating… I am sometimes a little heavy-handed with giving out stars because I like the end, AKA the most recent part of the book I read, rather than rating it as a whole.
And I haven’t read Egg & Spoon, but if you like Baba Yaga stories, I can’t recommend enough that you check out Enchantment by Orson Scott Card. It’s one of my favorite books, and I’ve probably read it about a dozen times.
Pfft I love your choices in Castiel gifs.
I think I’m in the minority here, but I don’t really find it hard to rate books. If I ever do have trouble rating a book, I just wait 10 or so minutes and reflect over the book and the rating comes to me.
And your rating process is really similar to yours. I’m usually rating and reviewing mentally while I’m reading too, and usually I know how I feel about the book by the time I’m about 150 or so pages in. (Although, of course, those feelings might change over the course of the story).
Lovely post Cait and thanks for sharing! ♥
Yes, I struggle all the time especially when I’m reading a tad outside my comfort zone. It’s one reason I keep my rating scale so simple (thumbs up or thumbs down) on my actual blog.
If I eat a book alive I’ve basically rated it before finishing it. But I think most of my ratings happen as I write and revise the review.
Terri M., the Director
Second Run Reviews
A thumbs up or down sounds like a really simple way of doing it! GO YOU!
I know that doesn’t translate well to review sites when you cross post, but I look at the little tags that pop up when you hover over the star ratings. Which ever words seem to describe my review best that’s what I go with.
Like you, I have an idea of the rating about half way through the book. The ending might blow me away so that might change though 🙂 I’ve particularly struggled with rating The Selection by Kiera Cass. The book has so many faults and the most annoying characters ever, yet I still enjoyed the setting. Go figure. I rarely give 5 stars now. I’ve become very very strict when it comes to rating since I started my blog.
I struggle a lot with ratings. Sometimes it is evident to me what the rating is going to be. But the ones that are the trickest for me to decide is when I am debating between two or three starts. And second hardest is if it was a very good three star read an miiiight just make it into four star territory. Seeing as I don’t put .5 in my ratings, it can be super difficult DD: I am like you – thinking of the rating even as I am reading!
Yes, yes, and yes!
The majority of the time, I read books and I know exactly how to rate them and your comments about mentally sliding the rating up and down when you read are SO ACCURATE. I do that too! I’m always thinking about star ratings while I’m reading and usually come to a conclusion before finishing a book. But lately, I’ve had quite a few that have just left me going HUH? I recently read The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling and it was SO FREAKIN’ BORING. AND DEPRESSING. But then the ending totally threw me a curve ball and then I didn’t know what to think. And it did make me think a lot, and it was well written… so I IS CONFUSED!!!
I think I find it hardest to rate books when I know I’m finding them ridiculously entertaining while also being aware that there are so many issues with plotting, writing, sterotyping etc, and liking it anyway. It’s a case of heart vs brain!
*hi fives* WE ARE LIKE TWINS ON THIS MATTER THAN, MY FRIEND. Those kind of books where the ending just stampedes all opinions and makes everything impossible? Agh. Yes. I HEAR YA. They are probably the worst, because does one rate the ending or the insufferable beginning?!!
I definitely form the rating while I read. I just finished Dorothy Must Die and really struggled with its rating because I HATED THE BOOK, but was also pretty invested in it. The concept was great, but I thought it was horribly written. There were many times when I just wanted to put it down and read something else, but other times when I had to keep going because I was sucked in.
And there are other books that I didn’t really enjoy reading, but I acknowledge that they were well-crafted and deeper than the surface. Those are always tricky to rate. Usually, though, I rate based on the writing style and technique more so than how interesting the plot was.
Awk, I’m sad you had such a bad time with Dorothy Must Die. :'( I loved that one. XD I thought the writing was excellent…so just goes to show how subjective reading is right?!! But I AGREE. Those kind of feelings are like so so hard to rate. I usually just concentrate on how much I enjoyed the book. But seriously I give out a lot more 1-stars than I used to. Gawsh. I feel bad, but IT HAPPENS.
I really, really, really hate rating some books. I stopped doing it for my blog, but I still must do it for Amazon and Goodreads. Some books are easy five stars, but I struggle with some. And no, you are not the only one to go into books already thinking about a rating. I started doing that soon after starting my blog last year. And throughout the entire book, I think about notes for a blog review or what I want to rate it on Amazon.
First, I love all of your photography in this post. You make the books look exciting and romantic. I like that you include other elements in the image in addition to the books. On my blog, I don’t rate my books. I think we all see the # of stars differently. For example, you mentioned “hoping for at least a 4” when to me a 4 is any book I like, recommend to others, and think was well written. A 5 means it is amazing and could end up on my “best of” list for the year. I fear that an explanation in the sidebar is ignored and people bring their own conceptions to the rating numbers.
When I was teaching people never wanted to see a “C” on a paper, which supposedly meant average, but people think means loser. I think it’s the same thing with ratings of 3 or less. I give 3s frequently. The number I give least frequently is 2. But these star ratings are only on Goodreads and NetGalley. On my blog I just write a wrap-up paragraph about why I felt the way I did and who else might like the book. Maybe some day I’ll develop my own 5-point rating system that is easily explainable to others.
I LOATHE and DESPISE rating books. Sometimes. Because sometimes the book isn’t all neat and able to fit in a nice star. Which is why I had half stars. But then I changed my ratings to cats and I felt awful having a half cat rating because I would have had to CUT THE CAT IN HALF (well, the graphic of the cat. I do not use live cats when rating novels, although that would be really cute with their mewling and everything). But then even that was difficult because of GOODREADS NOT HAVING HALF STARS.
But, heavenly and thankfully, most of the time my ratings come to me easily, and after only a few minutes (or sometimes no minutes!), I have my rating.
I do think of my rating when reading my books, and I’m always disappointed when it ends up lowering throughout the duration. It’s like watching icecream melt before you get to eat it. Or something else that’s really sad and letdowny. I recently experienced that with a book. It was a solid three star (perhaps even a little bit above), and then the last 20% were horrific and horrendous and horrible, and it went down to a two star.
I am also very frugal with my five stars. So even if I liked everything about a book, and my review is all but glowing, if I didn’t get the ~feels~ that are required for a five star, it’ll only get four. And then people are confused and ask me: why not five stars? And I have to explain that five stars are magical beings reserved for books that cut open my heart with the edges of their pages and then sit in their gleefully and happily until said heart stops beating and I cannot read any more books. Ever.
OMGGG, THIS COMMENT THOUGH. I am just flailing over the “magical beings reserved for books that cut open my heart with the edges of their pages” part because heck yes. That is the best description of what books do to me EVER. Although I’m much more liberal with my 5-stars. Only because I feel like life is short and throwing 5-stars around is NECESSARY to my sanity. *nods* I totally admire you for keeping them for the truly excellent and freakishly fantastic books.
SOMEONE NEEDS TO FIX GOODREADS.