Good afterevenmorn, Readers!

Not too long ago, I broke my long absence from video-format social media, which is just a very wordy way of saying I’m back on TikTok. I had abandoned it in the middle of the year when life slammed into me pretty hard and I needed some time and space for grieving (I lost my beautiful cat rather suddenly and unexpectedly). It wasn’t a deliberate decision, I just couldn’t handle much at all, so a lot of things just got abandoned while I worked through my stuff.

Two or so weeks ago, I returned, and ho boy, the tea is tea-ing. There’s so much drama on BookTok, specifically. There are currently three major dramas going on at present that I’m aware of, one of which really got under my skin, but I’m not touching it at present. I’m too annoyed, and I’m not even the audience that was directly insulted. Instead, I want to address writers very specifically on reviews, reviewers and review spaces.

Now, I’m not going to use names here. The author in question has been tagged in every kind of reaction video possible, and I’m sure they’re overwhelmed for what I feel was a well-meant error. But an error nonetheless. Last I heard, they’ve been chased off TikTok with the volume and intensity of the reactions.

Essentially, this debut author responded to a negative review. Not in any way that was rude, or whiny, or harsh. It was very sweet and well-meant, I think. Essentially, they popped up on the review and told the reviewer that they were sorry the experience of reading the book wasn’t great and advised the reviewer to return the book since that was the case.

Very mild stuff.

What was said was not the problem. It’s the fact that it was said at all.

As a writer, I know the temptation to know what people are thinking about your work is overwhelming. For writers who grew up in the age of social media, the desire to connect with readers must be incredibly strong, not least of all because a close community of readers can be the thing that propels a writer’s work into virality. Which would be amazing for book sales. Both these things together can create the perfect storm which may result in a colossal misstep as what happened in this case.

Let me address the first thing first.

Following reviews of a book you’ve written and released into the world is something that many writers do, I have no doubt. I certainly have, but that’s because I also have to do my own marketing, and having positive reviews up and shared is part of the whole trying to get book sales thing. So I cannot fault this author for haunting these spaces.

If an author happens to be lucky enough to be published by a press that has a marketing department, then it’s probably best to no be there at all, however. Not every review is going to be good, and from experience, it’s the less than kind reviews that will stick in one’s mind and crush the soul. It won’t matter how many wonderful reviews are there. Those few (or perhaps many, who knows?) poor reviews will work their way into the mind and live there forever. If for no reason than your own mental health, I would strongly suggest not venturing into those spaces. Curiosity will, no doubt, drives many a writer there, but most wisely do nothing while there and never speak of it if they do visit.

But there is  another, much more important reason that writers should not be in review spaces, or interact with any reviews. Even the positive ones.

That reason is simply this:

Those spaces are for readers.

Reviews are by readers for other readers. It is a community for readers to talk, debate, enthuse (or hate, if they must). They can do none of these if they believe that an author is hovering on the edges, reading over their shoulders. It’s hard to be honest about a work if you are concerned you’ll hurt someone’s feelings, or live in fear of their fans following these writers into these spaces and start roughing folks up for their opinions. It does tend to happen, whether the author intends for it or not. Fans are going to defend their favourites from any perceived slight. And no reviewer wants to bear the brunt of that.

For someone who has been surrounded by social media their whole lives, where creator and fan interactions are the norm, it can be a difficult concept to get used to – that there are just some spaces where you now, as soon as you become a published writer, simply can no longer go. It doesn’t matter that you want to interact with readers of your work. It doesn’t matter how sweet or polite you are about it. You are interacting in a space that isn’t for you. You have made yourself a wasp at a picnic.

The minute you make your presence known, it shuts down the conversation. I mean, it’s the equivalent of a group of people chatting about a person or event and the people involved in it, only to have that person (or people) show up. That conversation ends immediately. And we can’t be having that in a space reserved specifically for that kind of discussion.

Interacting with reviews, particularly the negative ones, can also bring a whole mass of trouble, courtesy of fans who may feel the need to defend a writer or their work. It can turn really nasty really quickly, with internet mobbing that get so vicious that is has chased folks off the internet before now. Now, I’m not accusing this particular writer of sending their hordes after a reviewer who was less than thrilled with a book. Or that even most authors would. But fans follow their favourites, and these things can (and are likely to) happen, whether sanctioned by the author in question or not.

The threat of that happening also puts a dampener on the conversation if reviewers know that the authors are sniffing around.

The author in question did, in fact, come from content creation previously, where parasocial relationships are the norm. It’s different for writers. We can’t do that unless it’s in our own spaces. So, on this blog post, and on any of the posts I put online in any of my spaces, interaction is expected and encouraged.

A reviewer’s space, however (Goodreads or StoryGraph, or even reviews posted on their own blogs or social media), are not places for a writer to be. That’s for the reviewers and readers. It’s specifically designed for places where these folks can read, review and discuss without having to worry about what their honestly will bring. This has to be a hard and fast rule. These spaces should be sacrosanct. Without them, we risk losing the healthy community of readers we writers crave.

So writers, if you must ruin your mood by hunting for reviews, go stealth. Tell no one; before, during, or after. Mostly. The only person you can ever tell will be your therapist (and you may need one if you do decide to venture into the land of your reviews). They, too, are sworn to secrecy.

M’kay? M’kay.

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When S.M. Carrière isn’t brutally killing your favorite characters, she spends her time teaching martial arts, live streaming video games, and sometimes painting. In other words, she spends her time teaching others to kill, streaming her digital kills, and sometimes relaxing. Her most recent titles include Daughters of Britain, Skylark and Human. Her next novel The Lioness of Shara Mountain releases early 2026.