What a load of crap

10:19 am 6 October 2013
Tea Party Teddy - Dianne Harman

More blog practice...see if I can add multiple photos split by words.  Fun times!

 

So, I ran across the title of a book I found interesting...some bagging on politicians (gee I wonder why that would appeal right now).  

 

Funny, 3 weeks ago I may never have noticed all this, but now--just wow.  It's not even subtle. 

 

I took a look at the reviews..not an unusual pattern of 4 and 5 stars, plus a 3 and a smattering of 1 stars.  The 4/5s were nice enough if a little glowy and had a fair number of votes.  Fine.  

 

Looked at the lower stars...and now it's odd.  I expect a few negatives (there always are) on the negative reviews.  But these were swamped.  Enough to say (huh?) and actually download the sample to see.  Oh, it sucked alright.

 

What really struck me was the huge number of downvotes on the negs...really out of proportion to the numbers of upvotes.  Like, oh, say someone had a bunch of people just stop by to downvote.

 

So, I popped over to GR and looked at the author's page (you know, the public one that is published just so curious consumers can learn more).  I saw the group that the author belongs to. 

 
One, publicly displayed and interesting looking group is named "How to promote YOUR book on Amazon", which includes such interesting topics as "Review Swaps-- Authors supporting authors", " I will tweet, like your book, read it, and tag it on Amazon if you do the same for me. " and my favorite: " Kindle Review Swap".
 
I have no idea if this is related to the out of proportion down voting on the negative review, but three little clicks and all I can say is 'gee and I wonder why I find the review system distasteful these days'. 
 
And no, after reading the sample it's safe to say I will not be buying the book that started this.  The writing was juvenile, with simple typos that even this non-grammarian and creative speller found ridiculous.