bad book reviews

I’m Doing It; I Am Leaving A Bad Book Review…

Angela4 Comments

Second Chances (Sequel to Over You) – Christine Kersey

Second Chances cover image

I really wanted to like this book as much as I loved the first story, “Over You”. This story picked right up where the first book left off, literally a couple of days later. That made for a nice transition, but then the story became irritating. Or at least Jessica became irritating.

I have never heard one character in a story whine and complain as much as she was doing right from the beginning of “Second Chances”. And I have 4 daughters, so that is really saying something! Maybe it wouldn’t have been so off-putting if that was how she behaved in the first story, but it was not. Not even close.

She loves Kyle; she doesn’t trust Kyle. Maybe she should keep Alex waiting in the wings in case if things with Kyle don’t work out? She loves Kyle so much; she cannot trust Kyle. I know I am repeating myself here, but this is literally how every single chapter seemed to go. In one paragraph, she was so in love with Kyle and would do anything to keep him. The very next paragraph had her whining because she was so jealous of his former girlfriend. And it seemed like every paragraph of every chapter went back and forth like this.

It is like watching a tennis match when you don’t like tennis, don’t understand it, and could not care less who may win. I was beginning to not care who would end up with Kyle. Or how this story was going to end, for that matter.

Other than that, the saving grace of the story was the mystery that was sprinkled in concerning Jessica being threatened. Was it Kyle’s former girlfriend? Maybe it was her former boyfriend Alex? Or it could be the son of the man who was sent to prison for trying to kill her at the end of “Over You”. Some disturbing events quickly changed into odd and scary things happening to and around Jessica.

Unfortunately this part of the story also takes a perilous turn towards the ridiculous. I know I do not normally drop so many spoilers into a book review, but honestly, I am just trying to make sure you do not make the same mistake I made and buy this book.

Someone breaks into Jessica’s home in the middle of the night, holds a knife to her throat and threatens to kill her family if she does not go to the detective and tell them she lied about Mr. Harrington trying to kill her and Kyle. Oh, and tell the detective that it was actually Kyle who attacked Mr. Harrington, because he thought Jessica and he were having an affair.

And then he gets her to promise she will do this, and he leaves her home. And she goes to the police station the next day and tells them she may have been mistaken in what happened, etc. etc. etc and I cannot even go on with this.

Trust me; it is much worse if you read it for yourself. So just please don’t.

But in the end, they all live happily ever after.

Now, with all of that being said, I am not giving up on this author yet. There is also a new book coming out about Kyle’s ex-girlfriend and her young daughter. I may give this story a try, if it only costs me a couple of dollars. I really do have a vested interest in these characters, because the first story was written that well. The fact that Jessica was like a completely different person in character, thoughts, and actions in the second book made it very hard for me to read it. I kept asking myself what in the world happened to the Jessica from the first book.

Ah, well. It was only a few hours of my life that I will never get back.

Why I Will Not Review Your Book

Angela22 Comments

It really is nothing personal, and I do not turn down the opportunity to read a new story very often, but sometimes I do. And then the author takes it personally. Like I did not feel their story was worthy of my time, or I felt the description was so bad that I could not even stand the thought of opening it.

That is not the case. 99% of the time it is because they have written a book on a subject that I have no knowledge of, and my lack of knowledge is not going to allow me to write a fair review. I will get to that other 1% in a minute. But if you have written a book about birds of South America, or Buddhism, or aliens, you do not want me writing a review. Do I have anything against the birds of South America, or Buddhists, or aliens? Nope. None of the previously mentioned have ever done anything to me. But I do not know anything about them. So no; I do not generally read science fiction. There are some Sci-Fi stories that I have read, but the story was also steeped in other information that allowed me to get lost in it, and enjoy the story the way the author surely hoped I would.

It has nothing to do with the story, or the author, or the quality of their writing. It’s not you, it’s me…

Now; about that other 1%. I have read a couple completely unbearable books in the past year, and most of you know that I really do not try to say bad things about writers, or their stories. If I can’t say anything nice, I prefer to keep my mouth shut. But once I tell you that I will not be reading and reviewing your book, you should probably just leave it be. It is the unfortunate author who feels the need to blow up my email account and say unkind things that is likely to get an honest, horrible review of their book posted for the whole-wide-web to find and read.

Those of you whom I have been in contact with, whose stories I have purchased or you sent to me, and have not seen a review yet; I have not forgotten. And I will get it done. Sometimes life just happens to get in the way of my free time. Many do not realize that I have a full-time 45+ hours-a-week job, am the single parent to 4 daughters (3 still at home), and go to college when it strikes my fancy. I also have a couple other pans in the fire that need my attention from time-to-time.

I want, and appreciate, the gentle nudges you send me to ask about your review. Please continue to do so. I love to read. It is my one escape that allows me to relax, unwind, de-stress, and forget about my 17 year old driving my car all over town, my 23 year old stressing over paying for college classes, my 13 year old video chatting with 16 year old boys 3000 miles away, and my 10 year old who has no more responsibilities than to feed her guinea pig, yet gets mad at me because I forgot to do it for her.

I am grateful for my patient and understanding authors and followers, and it really is my goal to help promote and encourage as many of you as I am able to. Your stories truly do bring me joy, happiness, and adventure, and without them, I cannot even begin to imagine how much more difficult I would be for others to have to deal with!

So please keep writing, so I can keep reading!

Bashed – Barbara Marquardt – I Managed Almost 4 Chapters…

Angela1 Comment

…and then I could not take another word of it. I wanted to like it, and I tried to like it. But I just could not read any more of it.

(ATTENTION! If anyone decides to get this book, for free I hope, and skim through it, I would love to hear what your take was on the story. If 5 people can tell me I was wrong, I will remove this review, and send an apology to the author. Any takers?)

First, the premise of the story. A teacher at a high school, seemingly for the town’s cast-off kids whose parents stopped caring, gets locked into a storage room over Christmas break by an 18 year old who she has continuously had issues with because she tried to make him learn, but had no choice other than to fail him.

I did not read too far beyond this point, at least not far enough to get to the chapter where she is rescued.  The story continues with a battle between her and this student, the usual he-said-she-said things.  Per the synopsis, the public and school officials are quick to blame her after her rescue, because he is the star football player. The synopsis continues that this event changed her life in many ways, but as I am not going to continue reading this story, I cannot tell you what those changes are.

Bashed Cover Image

I stopped reading the story when Jean, the main character, was locked in the storage room. The storage room with a window. With a plexi-glass window. Already with a hole in it and spider-webbed cracks. I went back and literally read everything over again, trying to see if it mentioned some reason, somewhere, as to why she would not have broken the window and got out. Was it too small? Too high up? Why would you be looking out a window, at your freedom, and not try to get out?

I skimmed further along, because I really had to know if this glaring issue got resolved. I got to about the half-way point in the story, and the author mentioned that the room was on the 3rd floor. Thanks for letting me know.

Another issue, right from the start, was the lack of a cell phone.

Why was her purse and all of her belongings in the storage room, yet she has no cell phone. No cell phone. This book was published in 2009, and it is not set in the 1960’s. Why would she not have a cell phone?

I know; because if she had a cell phone, the author could not have written this story. What the author should have done, is explain why there was no cell phone, instead of just ignoring that flashing-neon error like no one would ever think twice about someone not having a cell phone.

The writing was also not very good, as far as sentence structure and the use of the English language in general. So even if I could of ignored the 2 huge errors that were distracting me, I could not read through the choppy use of the English language. Am I being harsh? Possibly. I will blame it on 2 wonderful weeks of vacation, and my first Monday back to work. Yeah; that’s it.

This story had one review on Goodreads, at 4 stars. It had 2 excellent reviews on Amazon, both from school teachers.  The free ebook site I got it from had 5 reviews, all 5 stars. But no actual written review. Just stars. You can buy it on Amazon for $9.00, or get it free from here: http://www.free-ebooks.net/ebook/Bashed

What To Do With That Horrible Book Review You Wrote

Angela13 Comments

Oh. Hello there. I hope you were not coming here to find the answer to what you should do with a horrible book review you wrote, because I have no idea. I actually was hoping someone could tell me.

As I have stated many times, it is not my intention to destroy anyone’s writing career, or write horrible things about their writing abilities. But when you pick up a book, and it was very poorly constructed, how do you avoid that huge problem while focusing your review on the underlying story that was actually pretty good?

If I post a review that I loved it, or even liked it, I destroy my reputation immediately. Trust me, if you saw this book and I gave it a top review and rating, you would think I was off my rocker. Now, the fact that this story had a few top ratings on Amazon also tells me that someone had their family members post reviews for their story. There were no ‘bad’ reviews for this particular story, or even reviews with much needed and deserved constructive criticism.

Book reviews are a touchy subject, especially to the writers who have no control over how the reader is going to interpret what they wrote. Did they understand the point you were trying to make? Did they misunderstand the dialect? Did they not realize the story was intentionally written like that? and on and on and on again…

One of my favorite quotes is about the fact that no two people will ever read the same story. I find it amazing that no one else read Harry Potter and got the same, identical things from it that I did. That is the beauty of books!

As a footnote, I do not want any of my recent authors who have sent me books or whose books I have purchased to panic. This post is NOT about you. I have had a couple people contact me within the last couple of days and I do not want them to think I am talking about their story 🙂 This is a story that I found on my own while I was looking for someone else’s book.

So at this point I am going to hold unto this review. This book is not a new release and I do not believe that more people will purchase this story, and that I did not prevent that from happening by holding unto this review. I want to do some more digging to see if I can find more ‘true’ reviews of this story and then go from there.