As the endless debate over negative reviews continues in the bookish corners of social media, some authors have risen up (yet again) to question why random readers think they have the right to leave a negative review of a book. Readers, these authors explain, do not understand art. They do not have the capacity to comprehend what the author meant to do. The only reason they would leave a negative review is because they were too silly to appreciate the true greatness of the work. (Or maybe they are just trolls who delight in crushing authors' dreams.) This take is...odd, to say the least. After all, if authors are not writing for readers, if they think they are the only one who can understand and appreciate what they just wrote, what is the point of publishing a book?
Of course, every author likely has the Ideal Reader in their head. The reader who is just like them and will get all the jokes, notice the subtleties, fall in love with the characters, and want to sing the praises of the book to the sky. For instance, one might assume that Dante's Ideal Reader of the Divine Comedy was a medieval Roman Catholic male, highly educated, who caught his numerous political and religious references, agreed with him generally in matters of politics and religion, and who appreciated Dante's poetic style and overall genius. Sadly, however, readers like that are scarce and even in his own day, Dante had to make do with whoever picked up his work, whether they understood all his references or not.
But a person does not have to be the Ideal Reader to understand or enjoy a book. They can simply be a person who, well, is good at reading! And there are plenty of these individuals online. Indeed, one might assume that the type of person who bothers to go online and write reviews at all is a person particularly interested in books. They might, actually, have whatever sort of credentials some authors are apparently seeking in readers--being librarians, educators, bookstore owners, publishing employees, or even fellow authors. People who leave reviews seldom mention their day jobs or try to "prove" why they deserve to criticize a book they read. We really cannot know if the person who left a one-star review is actually a highly acclaimed author, a well-known editor, or a former professional reviewer for a periodical. We cannot automatically assume anyone online who posts a negative review just "didn't understand the book."
But even if a reviewer is not "credentialed" in this way, they still are "allowed" to review a book. Readers are the intended audience for books, after all, so it seems odd to suggest that the people who routinely engage in books do not know what they are talking about. Of course, some readers might truly not understand a book. I admit seeing reviewers who were mistaken about simple plot elements (basic reading comprehension--no analysis required) or who completely missed the point of an entire book or who interpreted the book in a way opposite to pretty much every other reviewer. But that happens with reviews for every type of product. We have to trust consumers to be able to recognize when a review is an outlier and when the person seemed to have not really understood what the product was.
Books are for readers, and that means any reader can write a review. They do not have to prove that are educated enough or intellectual enough or artsy enough to do so. Because reviews are for consumers and the vast majority of those consumers are not going to be the Ideal Reader. They are just going to be a reader who wants to see if a book is a good fit for them or not. And that's okay. That is enough.
Undoubtedly reading negative reviews can be hurtful. And it may be tempting to soothe one's ruffled spirits by dismissing all negative reviews as the products of the unwashed masses, the people who just didn't get the author's genius. (Presumably the authors here are all taking it for granted that their books are all really five-star reads and could not possibly be...average. No one has ever written an average book, right?) But that is the type of venting one should save for their friends and family. Going online to declare publicly that any negative reviews are the products of stupidity is mostly just a good way to offend one's readers--the people who are supposed to be paying money for the books they are evidently now too ignorant to understand.
And, to be clear, when I write about negative reviews, I mean reviews where the reader has criticisms about aspects of the book, but where they explain these in a respectful manner. These types of reviews are distinct from mean reviews, where people just rant about how awful the author is. Too often, however, authors seem to view any type of negative review as mean, as if their art is above all criticism simply because they spent a lot of time on it. But talking about art is the fun part, and readers can hardly be expected to do that if they are hampered from being honest about their feelings, the good and the bad.
And, really, every book has negative reviews--and most readers understand that one person's two-star read could be their five-star read. It's subjective, and I have read many a book because I read a negative review of it first. The criticism part is what helps consumers make an informed decision. One person might rate a book poorly because it contains certain tropes--and those could be the same tropes that make another reader pick up the book. Trying to suppress negative reviews prevents reviews from doing their intended work of helping a book find the right reader instead of any reader.
Readers and authors are not at odds. Reviewers and authors are not at odds. All the people reading and reviewing books are doing so because they love books. They want more books! They want their favorite authors to write more books! But the discourse is tiring. Readers understand that putting a book out into the world is hard and even scary. They are not trying to ruin a person's career by saying they did not like a book. But not every book is for every reader. And readers are allowed to discuss that among themselves, even through reviews.
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