The first question of today and the 4th of the weekend is asked by Younella:
Congrats Younella you won a $10 store credit to Loose Id
Younella: Do you have a set criteria for the star system, or is it totally dependent on the individual reviewers tastes?
Dan:
While we do have a set description of what each “Love Bytes Heart” rating equates to, they are generalizations that we try to stick to, but each reviewer rates based on their own personal feeling about the book. Some of us rate tougher than others. For me personally, for example, you have to blow my socks off to get a 5.0, and it is hard to do.
Chris:
While we have always encouraged our reviewers to rate the books they read honestly, we have set up a general guideline for what those ratings mean in terms of stars (or hearts, as our graphics show). It is as follows:
1 heart Strongly Disliked It
1.5 heart — Didn’t Like It / Not For Me
2 heart — Mediocre
2.5 heart — It Was Ok
3 heart — It Was Good / Average
3.5 heart — Liked It / Above Average
4 heart — Liked It A Lot. Would Recommend
4.5 heart — Loved It. Would Recommend
5 heart — Absolutely Fantastic / Amazing. Would Recommend
It is not a scientific measure though, so a lot of the rating comes from the general feeling the reviewers is left at the end of the book as well as whatever other measures they take into account for the rating. It may not be the most unbiased way to rate books, but with so many different people here on Love Bytes we did try to find the easiest and fairest way for everyone…reviewers, readers, and authors alike.
Kimberley:
I always use the ‘pros’ and ‘cons’ table. I put what I liked as well as what I didn’t like about the book. The number of each determines the rating. It also ensures that it’s fair and balanced. It’s a weird number system I have that makes sense to me but would probably leave anyone else scratching their heads in confusion.
Alexander:
For me, a 5 star rating means that it will be a new “go-to” audiobook when I want a comfort read.
A 2 star for me would have been virtually unreadable because of either the story or narrator. I have never had a DNF
review book, although it was close once.
review book, although it was close once.
Roberta:
we are encouraged to give our honest thoughts on our reviews. we have the heart system and we decide what the ratings will be.
Dani(elle):
What is important is that you have a base of ratings like the one Chris mentioned above, we have a system in place.
Ofcourse you have your personal feeling with it , some will rate a bit higher then others for example but it is good to have a general rating in place I think. I think we never published a DNF one but we do have published 1 or 2 star rated reviews.
I am curious what kind of rating you think should be handled can you tell us what you think ?
for two of you there is a ecopy of an Extasy book of choice as a prize waiting 🙂
I think you should absolutely publish all reviews: DNF, 1 star, 2 star included. This isn’t Goodreads where everything is 4+ stars and as unreliable as the weather forecast for next week.
Maybe have another reviewer read the books rated DNF through 2 stars, just to see if it was simply personal preference, a trigger, or honestly poor writing? It’s always nice to have more than one perspective regardless, and I enjoy when blogs have two (or more) reviewers evaluate the same book. Maybe that could be a new feature for LoveBytes?
Thank you for the star system. It is a good way to have consistent ratings. As a reader I know that all of you rate according to this system. So if a book is rated 5 star I know it is an absolute must read.
Star systems are a good guideline so others know why you put that. On my Goodreads page I have one so people know how I rated their books.
I like the five heart system, more would just get too confusing!
It’s interesting that a lot of sites have different rating systems but I think if a book gets a low mark I’d like to know why and of course a five star read usually goes on my wish list.
Thank you for explaining, I only “review” on GR and the Zon and I’m sure you would all think I’m too generous, constantly giving 4 /4.5/5 star ratings, but on the other hand I’m possibly too safe in the books I read.
I think any reviewing system is difficult. Though I do pay attention to what the reviewer rates, the words of the review are what I truly look at to see how the book affected the reviewer.
I do like Nicki’s idea of getting a second opinion for a DNF/1-star book. It’s interesting to see everybody’s review system!
I’ll be honest. Most of the time I don’t read reviews of books I haven’t yet read because when I do get to read the book I want my opinion to be completely unbiased. Lots of times I don’t even read the blurb completely.
That said, ratings are difficult because they are subjective. One person’s trash is another’s treasure. What really blows off one’s socks may suck for another. I’m like Dan, I’m a tough cookie & something has to be really fantastic for me to give it a 5-star rating. It has to really make me laugh or cry or turn my hatred of the characters to love or otherwise move me in some way. The majority of the ratings I give books are 3s or 4s.
IMO if the heart rating is working then it doesn’t need to be fixed. If there’s a 1 heart or DNF and the reviewer gives a good explanation of why they’ve rated that way, then that should be enough.
Thanks for sharing your review system. It’s interesting how you all differ. I have to follow Lisa on this about reading reviews. Usually i don’t read one unless the blurb doesn’t give me much or is just confusing, then i’ll read one. I find if I read a review before I read a book I end up expecting more of the book and will bias my opinion. If anything I’ll give the first paragraph of a review a read and very rarely read through a whole one.
Thanks for the info! Unlike others, I do like the star-system. To me, a book that is near the 3.5 but gets a 4 stars is not the same as an actual book that gets 4 or 4.25.
I’m not a big fan of half stars. But since most sites have a five star system I understand that you need to make a distinction, since five is not much to work with, when there are small details that make a book better/worse in comparison to other books.
Personally I’d prefer sites to have a ten star system. But then again, I might be happy with it, others might not^^
I read lots of books and have given 2 star reviews…even on Goodreads. I feel it I read a book and take the time to review it I should be honest with other readers and authors. I always find something good to say about a book…even if it’s just the setting is perfect or they didn’t have any editing errors!
Thanks for the answers. My having experience in measurement psychology, I’m suspicious of rating inflation on some of these sites and amongst readers, where they just don’t want to rate it too low (how can so many books be “amazing”?). That and a small scale then crowds the upper part of the scale, leaving less ability to make distinctions. Of course the rating is not the whole story, but I’m glad to see that you have inserted .5 into your system (vs. amazon or goodreads). People can indeed and want to make finer distinctions greater than 5 (up to 9 or 10 points is good), and it allows you to spread out the top rated ones more.
congrats tanja and Purplereader!