Q&A for Book Reviews

Klorrie’s Old Rating System

When I started this blog back in early 2018, I rated books based on a 5-star rating system. While a majority of my books fell between the 3-4 star range, there were a few that didn’t impress me enough to earn anything above two stars. I also had several that impressed me far beyond my expectations and received a 5-star rating.

Why I stopped using the rating system

One of the main reasons I do book reviews is to help new authors get their material noticed so that they can start making a name for themselves. The problem that comes with being a new author is that it only takes one bad, or even average, review to kill their career before it even has a chance to get started. I had never put much thought into it until I read Daniella Gaskell’s article on about giving honest reviews to self-published books.

The reality of it is that every book out there is going to accumulate its fair share of both good and bad reviews. Think of this hypothetical scenario: a well-established author like Stephen King has a recent novel that already has thousands of ratings that range between 1-5 stars. Let’s say that this is one of King’s best sellers and the vast majority of those thousands of ratings are 4-5 stars. There are also many ratings that are 3-star or lower (let’s say, 3,000 out of 10,000 reviews). Because King’s novel still has 7 thousand 4-5 star ratings, the 3 thousand low ratings will not carry as much weight in the book’s overall rating.

Now, let’s say that Jane Doe’s debut novel only has 4 ratings so far: a couple of 5-stars, 3-star, and 2-star. Let’s say she asks me to do an honest review and, as I read it, decide it’s not my cup of tea and give it a 2-star rating. If I were to give Jane a low rating, it would bring her overall book rating down so low that it won’t look appealing to not only future potential readers but also the platforms that promote them. Jane’s novel only has a couple of bad ratings compared to King’s thousands, but because she has so few readers, her overall rating score is much lower. Jane’s book loses its appeal and thus, tarnishes any hope of her selling more copies.

So how do you rate your books then?

Now that I have eliminated my original rating system, I will now only publish book reviews of those that I genuinely believe are worth reading.

That doesn’t, however, mean I won’t point out any of the things I didn’t like about a particular book or something that I might see as needing improvement. The rating scale is still valid in my mind, but if I rate a book less than 3-stars, it means I have no intention of posting about it.

The ONLY exception to this rule is if is a well-known classic or mainstream novel, in which case, the gloves are off. I will also post reviews explaining why I stopped reading a certain series after so many books in if I find it necessary.

Does that mean all of your recommendations are equivalent to 5-Star rated books?

No. The books I review will be between 3-5 star books (4-star is most common).

If I have read a book that receives a lower rating than that, I will not write about them. If an author requests an honest review and I cannot in good faith, give them a 3-5 star rating, I will contact the author and give them my input on their work, but I will not rate it for public viewing.

No one will know how many stars I officially give a book unless they win a Klorrie Cup Award, which is 5-stars.

What’s a Klorrie Cup Award?

What is a Klorrie Cup Award? It’s a special award that I give to my absolute favorite books (equivalent to a 5-star rating on Goodreads or Amazon). Any author who wins this award earns the right to include this reward on their website, book cover, or anywhere within the pages of the winning book. I also index each Klorrie Cup, so that each winning book gets their own unique number of authentication.

If a book wins a Klorrie award, I will contact the author to let them know through email or social media (provided that I have the contact information). Additionally, I will announce it at the top of my book review post, my social media accounts, and on my TikTok account. All fiction and poetry books that I read are eligible, even the classic and best-selling novels.

I came up with the idea of the Klorrie Cup Award as a way to make up for no longer using a 5-star rating system. I believe that a book worthy of 5-stars deserves a little something extra than a review of recommendation, thus the birth of the Klorrie Cup.

For authors asking me for honest reviews.

If I think your book is between 3-5 stars, it is automatically a book that is worthy of recommendation to other readers and I will write a post about it. In that post, I will express all the things that I liked as well as the things I didn’t like, by offering constructive criticism.

If your book isn’t posted, that does not mean I don’t intend to give you any feedback whatsoever. If requested, I will contact you through email and give you a private, honest review.

Please understand that I often have a long reading list and may not get to your book right away. It could take several months before I’m able to read your book. It all depends on how many honest review requests I have in the queue line.

What kind of books do I usually read?

I will give any genre a chance if I think it has a promising synopsis, but I typically stay away from war novels, erotica and westerns. That’s not to say I will not read those kinds of books, it just means that it will not have as high of a chance of getting a public review from me.

Please do not let that discourage authors and readers who enjoy those genres from hanging out on my blog or submitting a review request. I used to stay clear of sci-fi and romance novels, yet I have read enough of them in recent years from honest review requests to develop a fondness for them. I have even awarded Klorrie Cups to several sci-fi and romance novels, and I now read both genres regularly. If you think your book is good enough to pique my interest in a genre that I normally don’t read, then I would love to give it a chance!

 A good example of this would be The Evil Within, by E.R. Hendricks. It’s an erotic monster romance story, which is not something I am interested in. The story, however, is well-written and intriguing, so I deemed it worthy to make my review list. While it may not fall into the targeted audience, I believe that if I enjoyed it enough; it has great potential to be a 5-star rated book for the audience it was meant for. The same goes for children’s books, young adult novels, etc. If I feel that it has the potential to drive its target audience wild with fandom, I will recommend it on my blog.

I will give any fiction genre a chance.

What I will not review

As already mentioned, I will not publicly review anything less than 3-stars. I will also stay away from non-fiction books and biographies. I will not review comic books, but I will review graphic novels.

What about poetry?

I have a deep fondness for poetry. I’ve reviewed more poetry books than any other genre so far. I’ve even published 3 of them myself. Poetry books are always welcome!

If a writer has a poetry blog or a poem that has not been published in a publication, I will still showcase any of their poetry that I like and include information to their blogs, social media, etc. so that they can build a following. I am all about helping new writers get noticed. That is the primary reason I do reviews.