Friday Book Blogger Hop - August 27, 2010

Well, I need to get fully back in the swing, and what better way to do it than to get in on the Friday (well, really Friday through Monday) Book Blogger Hop hosted by Jennifer over at Crazy for Books?

What is it?  Well, it's a way to for bloggers and readers to find each other.  You write a little post about the subject of the week and link it up.  THEN (and this is the important part), you hit a few of the other linked up blogs (you can spread it throughout the weekend), visit, comment, follow if you like what you see, and make new friends.

I really like that she asks a different question each week for us to answer to participate.  This week's question is:

Do you use a rating system for your reviews?  If so, what is it and why?

Well, yes, I do ... it's right over in the right sidebar, but here it is as well:

I'm not a book snob. I may consider myself a bit intellectual, but a book doesn't have to be high and lofty for me to enjoy it. My ratings system is based purely on my own personal enjoyment while reading:

1 star - read only if you regularly read cereal boxes for entertainment
2 stars - read if you're VERY hard up for something, ANYthing to read
3 stars - didn't HATE it, but ... would rather have been washing my hair
4 stars - worth the read, even if it stutters a bit here and there
5 stars - a keeper; fun and engaging all the way

My problem with rating is that I'm very reluctant to rate a book below 3 stars (although I have done so on occasion).  Right now, one of the books I'm reading is going to be 2 stars if it's lucky .. just attempting to read it is giving me a headache.  I just keep thinking to myself, "Look at all of the lovely books you have sitting there just waiting to be read and enjoyed, and here you are wasting good reading time on THIS".  Sigh .. but I have made a promise to myself from now on to finish a book once I've committed to reviewing it, no matter how bad it is at the beginning, because sometimes they get better, and it's really only fair to the author to give them a fair shot. 

On the other side, you'll also rarely see a 5 star rating from me.  I just finished a five-star book by Mitchell Kaplan, however, and reading a book like that makes it easier to at least give that (so far) 2 star book a chance. 

To me, writing a book is a craft.  It takes much time and thought and patience and the finished product is like that author's "baby", so I need to at least give respect to the author's effort.  It would be like me spending a month or two knitting a bright orange, yellow, black and white striped scarf .. even though the end product is almost hideous, I DID put a lot of time into it and I created something out of a few lengths of string, really.  Creating something from pure thought is an even more difficult process, and it's a skill that I really don't have - at least not enough to actually form a full novel or even a short story, so I feel a great deal of respect for those who are willing to put their creations out there for us to enjoy (or not).

I appreciate that publishers, publicists and authors value my opinion enough to offer me their "babies" for review, and if occasionally, a baby that needs a bit of a spanking slips through the mainly enjoyable creations, then I just have to toughen up a bit and call it like I see it, even when the author feels that it's the best baby in the world.