The End of the Silence of the Lambs

Before there was an Internet, book reviewers ruled the literary world. Their words of wisdom appeared in ink on paper and all a writer could do about a bad review was bleat to his or her friends about how unfair it was. All a reader who disagreed with a review could do was write a letter to an editor. Which might or might not ever get seen.

Writers complain about reviews that mention things that never happened in books, reviews that synopsize the subplot of a book and ignore the plot, and reviewers that switch characters’ names and occupations. Some reviewers have personal vendettas against writers, forget to mention that to their editors, then go ahead and write scathing reviews. (Anyone remember the John Simon/ Norman Mailer debacle a few years ago?)

Unfair reviews are infamous. In fact there’s a whole book of them called: Rotten Reviews. One of my favorites is that a writer renowned for his communistic sympathies was asked to review Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.

Often members of the one sex are asked to review books aimed at the opposite sex, with unfortunate results. James Lorimor reviewed Wuthering Heights and said, "The only consolation which we have in reflecting upon it is that it will never be generally read." Paul Theroux reviewed Jong’s Fear of Flying and said it, "…pictures women as a hapless organ animated by the simplest ridicule, and devaluing imagination in every line… represents everything that is to be loathed in American fiction today."

But the Internet is taking the sting and punch out of reviewers’ bon mots.

A few years ago, when the trailblazers at Amazon.com invited audience participation from readers, they put in place a weapon for a revolution in the book world. Readers can be now be reviewers with clout and presence. Writers can now respond to reviewers and have an open dialogue with their readers. It’s novel, it’s creative. It’s changing the way people choose books as we know it. And isn’t it about time?

Recently, Amazon reviewed my novel Lip Service. For some strange reason, they gave it to a man to review. Sure, some men like my book. And some women like Rambo movies. But I wouldn’t ask a woman to review one. She’s not the movie’s target audience.

The Amazon reviewer didn’t "get" the point of my book. Not many men are going to–unless they’re the type who don’t balk at walking their girlfriend’s 7lb French poodle, are willing to go see a "date" movie even after they’ve been married for three years, and have a least two, good female friends with whom they talk on the phone.

That doesn’t matter to me. What does matter is that now when a woman goes to Amazon.com and reads this guy’s review, she won’t have a clue as to whether or not she might be interested in my novel. If this were twenty, even ten years ago, there wouldn’t be a damn thing I could do about it but be a good little lamb and keep silent. But this is the year 2000. So, excuse me while I go post a noisy rebuttal on Amazon.

MJ Rose is the author of Lip Service, the first novel discovered online. It’s now a Featured Alternate Selection of both the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club.