Here's another interesting tidbit for all of you"
Publishers Weekly has also published the book The Battle of 9.99, a book about the now infamous price setting at Amazon. I know that some of you remember this. Some might even remember getting into an argument on either side. For those who don't immediately remember, here's the story in a nutshell:
Amazon wanted to set their ebook prices at $9.99 to entice readers to their then still newborn Kindle e-book reader. It meant that they were taking a deep price cut in their profits, but they were really pushing for these readers to succeed since let's face it: previous attempts by other companies to market e-readers had failed spectacularly. This didn't sit well with many of the big publishers, who threatened to pull their e-book contracts with Amazon if they didn't reset the prices to what the publisher specifically wanted. Now the messed up part is that the publishers supposedly didn't lose any money coming in, Amazon did. However according to this book, what really scared the pants off of the publishers was really the idea that Amazon would undermine the industry.
As many know, this sparked widespread condemnation of first Amazon (with people assuming that they changed it voluntarily) and then later the publishers themselves. People petitioned, posted negative reviews, and some even railed against the authors, many of whom were actually for the lower price setting. This price war brought a lot of attention to the ebook world and to the idea of ebook prices in general, regardless of how you stood on the matter.
So now Publishers Weekly has put out a 58 page book about the whole shebang from the viewpoint of Andrew Albanese. It's going for $1.99 on Amazon, if anyone's interested. I might give in and buy it myself so I can give it a whirl.
Further Reading:
*'The Battle of $9.99,' a PW Original E-book
*Amazon page
*ebooks: Apple is Guilty in The Battle of the $9.99
A blog where I review a little bit of everything, especially urban fantasy, anthropological thrillers, mysteries, and anything along the lines of James Rollins.
Showing posts with label amazon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label amazon. Show all posts
Monday, October 21, 2013
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Amazon to launch fanfiction platform
Fan fic on the kindle? Critics of the idea of "pulled to publish" fanfiction will probably have a lot to say about this.
Recently Amazon announced that they're opening up a new publishing platform Kindle Worlds. The platform would enable fanfiction authors to publish their works for a profit without having to actually change anything in the works themselves, supposedly. All with the approval of the publisher/company that owns the rights to the books or shows in question. Of course the author won't get the lion's share of the money charged per book. Authors of longer works (10,000+ words) will receive 35% of the price for their books while ones who have written less than 10,000 words will only get 20%. According to Entertainment Weekly, the pricing will be between 99 cents and $3.99.
So far only one company has decided to play ball with this new format, Warner Bros, and only for three very specific book turned television show series: Gossip Girls, The Vampire Diaries and Pretty Little Liars. This limits the amount of fanfiction that can be published, as not everyone wants to write fanfiction for these shows, but it'd be interesting to see if any other companies would come aboard if this does well.
There isn't a set time as to when this will drop, but I'm of mixed emotions about this. There's no doubt that some fanfiction authors work very, very hard at what they do and put a lot of time and effort into ensuring that their specific works stick to canon or if not, would read as believable to their audience. Part of me thinks that there's nothing wrong with rewarding them by giving them money in a format that has the approval of the official copyright holders.
Then again, part of me is a little antsy about this because for some reason this just seems a little well, wrong. One of the core things about fanfiction is that it's written by fans, for fans for free. Technically there's nothing against the law about charging for fanfiction if the publisher has signed up for fanfics to specifically be published for profit. I can't even say anything about the very real inevitability about someone putting out a work that's not even worth ten cents, because we already get this with both self-publishing and the mainstream publishing world.
So I can't quite put my finger on why this bothers me so much. Maybe there's just a worry about this going from someone exploring their love for a show/book/movie to where it turns solely into something they're doing for profit. Or maybe I'm just afraid that people will only publish fanfiction and not create their own worlds. Both are possibilities, but the second has always been a fear for fanfiction and the first is something that goes on in the publishing world already. How many times have we seen authors pump out garbage because they know it'd be a guaranteed sell because of name recognition? Neither are really feasible reasons to not publish fanfiction for profit because that'd be punishing a lot of authors who either aren't interested in putting out non-fanfiction work and/or have no interest in actually getting rich-rich off their work. (But don't mind getting a little money.)
Or perhaps I'm afraid that this might be a way for publishers and companies to start actively cracking down on fanfiction authors. I haven't heard of any whisper of censorship for the works, but it's a possibility. It's well within a publisher's right to request that certain things not be published under their banner, although I will admit that I doubt that they'd refuse to publish things such as slash fanfiction. I can't even say that the publishers can now go after people who aren't publishing under their banner, because that would probably take more money and time than it'd be worth- although it'd be interesting to see if Warner Bros would seek for Fanfiction.net to remove fanfiction for the three shows mentioned above.
I guess all we can do is just wait and see.
Further Reading:
*Amazon to launch fanfiction platform (Entertainment Weekly)
*Amazon to allow e-book fan fiction sales in US (BBC)
Recently Amazon announced that they're opening up a new publishing platform Kindle Worlds. The platform would enable fanfiction authors to publish their works for a profit without having to actually change anything in the works themselves, supposedly. All with the approval of the publisher/company that owns the rights to the books or shows in question. Of course the author won't get the lion's share of the money charged per book. Authors of longer works (10,000+ words) will receive 35% of the price for their books while ones who have written less than 10,000 words will only get 20%. According to Entertainment Weekly, the pricing will be between 99 cents and $3.99.
So far only one company has decided to play ball with this new format, Warner Bros, and only for three very specific book turned television show series: Gossip Girls, The Vampire Diaries and Pretty Little Liars. This limits the amount of fanfiction that can be published, as not everyone wants to write fanfiction for these shows, but it'd be interesting to see if any other companies would come aboard if this does well.
There isn't a set time as to when this will drop, but I'm of mixed emotions about this. There's no doubt that some fanfiction authors work very, very hard at what they do and put a lot of time and effort into ensuring that their specific works stick to canon or if not, would read as believable to their audience. Part of me thinks that there's nothing wrong with rewarding them by giving them money in a format that has the approval of the official copyright holders.
Then again, part of me is a little antsy about this because for some reason this just seems a little well, wrong. One of the core things about fanfiction is that it's written by fans, for fans for free. Technically there's nothing against the law about charging for fanfiction if the publisher has signed up for fanfics to specifically be published for profit. I can't even say anything about the very real inevitability about someone putting out a work that's not even worth ten cents, because we already get this with both self-publishing and the mainstream publishing world.
So I can't quite put my finger on why this bothers me so much. Maybe there's just a worry about this going from someone exploring their love for a show/book/movie to where it turns solely into something they're doing for profit. Or maybe I'm just afraid that people will only publish fanfiction and not create their own worlds. Both are possibilities, but the second has always been a fear for fanfiction and the first is something that goes on in the publishing world already. How many times have we seen authors pump out garbage because they know it'd be a guaranteed sell because of name recognition? Neither are really feasible reasons to not publish fanfiction for profit because that'd be punishing a lot of authors who either aren't interested in putting out non-fanfiction work and/or have no interest in actually getting rich-rich off their work. (But don't mind getting a little money.)
Or perhaps I'm afraid that this might be a way for publishers and companies to start actively cracking down on fanfiction authors. I haven't heard of any whisper of censorship for the works, but it's a possibility. It's well within a publisher's right to request that certain things not be published under their banner, although I will admit that I doubt that they'd refuse to publish things such as slash fanfiction. I can't even say that the publishers can now go after people who aren't publishing under their banner, because that would probably take more money and time than it'd be worth- although it'd be interesting to see if Warner Bros would seek for Fanfiction.net to remove fanfiction for the three shows mentioned above.
I guess all we can do is just wait and see.
Further Reading:
*Amazon to launch fanfiction platform (Entertainment Weekly)
*Amazon to allow e-book fan fiction sales in US (BBC)
Sunday, January 6, 2013
Authors and Amazon Reviews: a nasty turn of events
I was just reading some of the posts in the Amazon Vine forum when I came across a thread that focused on a newer aspect of Amazon's review rules that I wasn't aware of:
The poster in question asked for a little more information and she was told this:
What this ultimately means is that a lot of people are seeing their reviews removed because they're an author in the same genre and because their review tripped some sort of arbitrary trigger to where it was "too negative". This would be grand if it meant that only the reviews along the lines of "LOLOLOL, this author sucks donkey balls, I would't read this out loud to a dying gerbil, every time you buy this book an orphan gets cancer, etc etc". No, I've been hearing that a lot of the reviews aren't the type of reviews that are soul crushing or anything to that extent.
I'm worried about what this could mean for a lot of reviewers. Does this mean that all it takes is for one person to say that their feelings were hurt that Rosie Romance's review of the new Nora Roberts book was too harsh and that since she's a romance author, that review should be removed? What constitutes the difference between an attack review and a review that states a person's honest feelings? If Rosie really didn't like the new NR and wants to leave a one star review comparing the book to morning dog breath and the stench of a hockey team's locker room after playoffs, then she should be able to.
I am aware that there are people out there who purposely set out to create a smear campaign for their fellow authors. They do exist, but they're in the minority. I'd say that they make up less than .01% of the authors out there. But this new rule lumps all authors in with that small minority and encourages people to leave ratings and reviews that they really don't believe in. A reviewer shouldn't set out to write a hateful review because in the end those reviews really only help that reviewer and a handful of other people, although it is their prerogative to write it if they so choose. But neither should they feel like they have to raise the star rating to a higher grade or sugarcoat their words because they're afraid of setting off some sort of censor bar.
I just feel like this is an attack on honest reviewing in general. There are serious problems out there in the review world. This much is obviously true but punishing everyone will only breed resentment and maybe even decrease interest in a lot of authors in general. Not to mention that it's more than a little insulting to us consumers. Like we can't tell the difference between a helpful negative review and an unhelpful one? Sure, we'll laugh at the ones comparing the author to an asteroid intent on negating all life on earth, but we then roll our eyes and move on to the next review. Most of us can tell the difference between a valid negative review and one where the person just wants to hand out a quart of haterade. Besides, even the overly negative reviews have their merit: how many of us picked up one of the infamously bad books this year because the negative reviews made it seem like it'd be a lark? I can name at least three that I picked up, so the idea of a negative review decreasing readership is somewhat a myth.
Further reading:
*The Value of Cover Quotes
*Why is Amazon deleting reviews written by authors of other authors' books?
Authors are allowed to review books on Amazon.com as long as they are not in the same genre as the reviewer's own book. Also, the reviews must be positive and within guidelines. Please see our posted guidelines on what is acceptable content:
The poster in question asked for a little more information and she was told this:
As stated in our previous correspondence Authors are allowed to review books on Amazon.com as long as they are not overly negative reviews in the same genre as the Author's own book. This is in place to prevent competing Authors from attempting to drive sales away from others and attempting to increase the
m on their own books.
What this ultimately means is that a lot of people are seeing their reviews removed because they're an author in the same genre and because their review tripped some sort of arbitrary trigger to where it was "too negative". This would be grand if it meant that only the reviews along the lines of "LOLOLOL, this author sucks donkey balls, I would't read this out loud to a dying gerbil, every time you buy this book an orphan gets cancer, etc etc". No, I've been hearing that a lot of the reviews aren't the type of reviews that are soul crushing or anything to that extent.
I'm worried about what this could mean for a lot of reviewers. Does this mean that all it takes is for one person to say that their feelings were hurt that Rosie Romance's review of the new Nora Roberts book was too harsh and that since she's a romance author, that review should be removed? What constitutes the difference between an attack review and a review that states a person's honest feelings? If Rosie really didn't like the new NR and wants to leave a one star review comparing the book to morning dog breath and the stench of a hockey team's locker room after playoffs, then she should be able to.
I am aware that there are people out there who purposely set out to create a smear campaign for their fellow authors. They do exist, but they're in the minority. I'd say that they make up less than .01% of the authors out there. But this new rule lumps all authors in with that small minority and encourages people to leave ratings and reviews that they really don't believe in. A reviewer shouldn't set out to write a hateful review because in the end those reviews really only help that reviewer and a handful of other people, although it is their prerogative to write it if they so choose. But neither should they feel like they have to raise the star rating to a higher grade or sugarcoat their words because they're afraid of setting off some sort of censor bar.
I just feel like this is an attack on honest reviewing in general. There are serious problems out there in the review world. This much is obviously true but punishing everyone will only breed resentment and maybe even decrease interest in a lot of authors in general. Not to mention that it's more than a little insulting to us consumers. Like we can't tell the difference between a helpful negative review and an unhelpful one? Sure, we'll laugh at the ones comparing the author to an asteroid intent on negating all life on earth, but we then roll our eyes and move on to the next review. Most of us can tell the difference between a valid negative review and one where the person just wants to hand out a quart of haterade. Besides, even the overly negative reviews have their merit: how many of us picked up one of the infamously bad books this year because the negative reviews made it seem like it'd be a lark? I can name at least three that I picked up, so the idea of a negative review decreasing readership is somewhat a myth.
Further reading:
*The Value of Cover Quotes
*Why is Amazon deleting reviews written by authors of other authors' books?
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
And you thought your review was bad?
Hi all!
I couldn't help but post what I think has to be one of the most negatively reviewed books out there:
random S&M bits, bad soap opera dialog, senseless plot changes (when you could find the plot), zero demensioned characters, over simplistic explainations....GRRRR.... i am so stunned at how bad this was, i can't even spell right!! neither could the author, nor can she write anything beyond an 8th grade level, as far as i could tell. this book begs the question, was it blackmail or what, that got this drivel published?
i have half a mind to email the writer so i can demand back the half an hour of my life i gave to this 'book'! i can't even bring myself to take this back to the used shop i bought this in, i just threw it away. i didn't want anyone to see that i had actually spent money on it...did i mention this book was horrid? yes, i thought so....."
I actually feel a little sorry for the author, if she read any of it. It's all valid criticism but ouch. The reviews on Goodreads aren't much better. So next time you think that your negative review is bad, just remember that that person probably isn't stating that they would rather roll in glass and bathe in lemon juice than to read the book again.
I couldn't help but post what I think has to be one of the most negatively reviewed books out there:
I came across these Amazon reviews while going about my merry way, looking for things to report on. I'll just say that this has to be one of the nastiest, yet funniest, negative reviews I've ever read. It's so over the top that you honestly can't say that it's really offensive. At least not when you compare it to reviews for books such as the Maradonia series by Gloria Tesch. But then again, that's a different story since she managed to somehow get the attention of ED.
Reviews for this book on Amazon have nuggets such as:
"Sweet mother of pearl! Cynthia Soroka has created a masterpiece. This book should be purchased by every aspiring author for inspiration. If (...)this can get published, then so should just about any author who can string a couple words together."
"This book was so bad, the bookstore owner tried to talk me out of buying it!"
"The characters are such hollow cliches that you will laugh at their illogical (and pointless) predicaments, and cry when you realize that you still have more pages to wade through. You will find yourself unable to choose between reading more of the horrid, soap opera dialogue and being punched in the stomach repeatedly by a random thug."
All culminating in the following review:
"this is the worst book i have EVER tried to read. bar none, totaly the worst. i would rather roll over tiny bits of broken glass, then jump into a vat of lemon juice than ever have to even look at the cover of this book ever again. i can only guess the ONE 'fan' must have read a different book. Reviews for this book on Amazon have nuggets such as:
"Sweet mother of pearl! Cynthia Soroka has created a masterpiece. This book should be purchased by every aspiring author for inspiration. If (...)this can get published, then so should just about any author who can string a couple words together."
"This book was so bad, the bookstore owner tried to talk me out of buying it!"
"The characters are such hollow cliches that you will laugh at their illogical (and pointless) predicaments, and cry when you realize that you still have more pages to wade through. You will find yourself unable to choose between reading more of the horrid, soap opera dialogue and being punched in the stomach repeatedly by a random thug."
All culminating in the following review:
random S&M bits, bad soap opera dialog, senseless plot changes (when you could find the plot), zero demensioned characters, over simplistic explainations....GRRRR.... i am so stunned at how bad this was, i can't even spell right!! neither could the author, nor can she write anything beyond an 8th grade level, as far as i could tell. this book begs the question, was it blackmail or what, that got this drivel published?
i have half a mind to email the writer so i can demand back the half an hour of my life i gave to this 'book'! i can't even bring myself to take this back to the used shop i bought this in, i just threw it away. i didn't want anyone to see that i had actually spent money on it...did i mention this book was horrid? yes, i thought so....."
I actually feel a little sorry for the author, if she read any of it. It's all valid criticism but ouch. The reviews on Goodreads aren't much better. So next time you think that your negative review is bad, just remember that that person probably isn't stating that they would rather roll in glass and bathe in lemon juice than to read the book again.
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Author Behaving Badly: Emily Giffin
Seriously authors, what is it about negative reviews that draw you to them like kittens to catnip flavored milk? Ignore them. There is no good aftermath to reacting to negative reviews.
Today's ABB is actually a husband behaving badly. Maybe not "Candace Sams is calling the FBI bad", but it's pretty abhorrent behavior for any author, let alone a professional one.
Author Emily Giffin recently received a one star rating on her book Where We Belong, which released last month. The review read as follows: (click here to go straight to the review)
This book was so disappointing. I have read all of Emily Giffin's books, and have found that her last few books are getting worse and worse. Where We Belong had the ability to be a great story. However, telling the story from two points of view, Marianne and Kirby, led there to be little depth to either character. Also I found both characters to be very unlikable. The story was trite and unbelievable. I also found that Giffin put a very negative spin on adoption. Giffin's last books have been a disappointment and this one was no different.
A little light, but overall it's not some angry missive where the reviewer is just slinging bile. It's one of the more mild negative reviews I've seen out there and I've seen some reviews that completely rip a novel to shreds and use it as kitty litter. (Not that those kinds of reviews are wrong, just that people can and have been more harsh in their criticisms of things.) The reviewer did at least try to state why they didn't like the book.
That's where Giffin's husband stepped in. I'm posting the following exchange "as is".
There is no excuse for coming on and attacking a reviewer like this, calling them a "psycho" because they only have one review to their name. All that could mean is that this reader felt so strongly about this book that they decided to leave a review. It's fairly common and guess what? It means that at one point that reader was such a big fan of Giffin's work that the letdown to them was that much more of an impact. It doesn't make her "psycho" at all.
Now you'll notice that there's a huge lag time between responses. Why is that? It's because about three hours ago (8/21/12) Giffin posted about the review on her facebook account, bragging about her husband's actions on facebook.
I can see where one could argue that the #1 post wasn't that bad. I can understand complaining about that to a degree, as I'm sure that it is fairly disappointing to get so close to the first spot and not achieve it. That I'm not really going to criticize any as that's not really behaving bad as much as it's an overachiever thing.
What bothers me is that the assistant saw the original review, the one that started all of this, as a personal attack and that the husband was justified. It was not a personal attack against the author. I can't stress this enough. The review was just an ordinary, average reviewer stating his or her reasons as to why they disliked the book and that they'd been disappointed with the books for a while. That is not a personal attack. A personal attack would be if the reviewer had said something along the lines of "Giffin is just stuck up and thinks she's too good to eat her vegetables, she's the anti-christ" or something like that. That's a personal attack and if the original reviewer (AvidReader) had said something like that in their review, I'd agree whole heartedly that it would be an attack. But they didn't state anything like this.
I also don't think that charity work excuses awful behavior or condoning her husband going on line and picking at reviewers. She could have given a kidney to a sick child, but that doesn't mean that she or her husband have the right to attack reviews. That's just not appropriate and being an otherwise good person does not mean that after you give out 100 books your husband gets to call a reviewer names while you extol his virtues online and brag about it. That's like saying that after I finish feeding the homeless I get to swipe a dollar from the offering plate at church.
The assistant also claims that Giffin never slammed another author. That's nice and I encourage Giffin to not slam another author. But this is different. This is Giffin's husband slamming a reviewer and Giffin indirectly encouraging her fans to go titter at the remarks and downvote the review. I say indirectly, but any time you link to a negative review you're pretty much full on endorsing an attack on a negative review. There's no getting around this fact and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you're painting a target on a person who is not a professional, bought your book with their own money, and then decided to take their time to write a review. This is actually a little worse than slamming another author because this was a comment to one of your fans. You know, the people who buy your books, pay your salary, and put you where you were? That's biting the hand that feeds you and regardless of how many hands you have coming your way, it's incredibly nasty to accuse someone of being a psycho just because they wrote a negative review.
UPDATE 3:
I was just informed in the comments that Corey has received harassing phone calls, getting one where someone told her to go kill herself.
Seriously, what is wrong with some people? I don't know if anyone who called her has or is reading this, but seriously, that's not cool. Now if we want to bandy about the term "psycho" then this is a situation where it would apply. Corey changed her vote rating based upon her personal feelings. I might not necessarily be 100% comfortable with it, but it's her personal freedom and right to do as she pleases with her review. It's her review and she can do whatever she wants with it. If she wants to recite the National Anthem backwards then that's her prerogative to do so. It might not be what I'd write, but guess what? It's not my review and I have no right to tell her what she can or can't say. Neither, might I add, does anyone else, regardless of what your personal feelings might be.
Where the line gets drawn is when you have someone taking the time to track down someone's personal information, call them, and tell them to go kill themselves. Let me repeat that: someone feels that Corey should die because she *gasp* changed her mind on a review and gave it one star. Not because she's done a Casey Anthony or because she stole from a million orphans, but because she wrote a review that someone didn't agree with.
So guys, that's not cool. Actually, I'm fairly sure that there's probably harassment laws created specifically against this sort of thing. You are not being a good fan by calling Casey and telling her to "go kill herself". If you really want to support Giffin despite the actions of her and her husband, then do so with your wallet. Buy her books. If you enjoyed them, leave her positive reviews. That's how you support an author. Not by calling people and harassing them. Not by bombarding reviews and saying nasty things to them like "you only read Harlequins, this book must be too advanced for you" or insinuating that they're in any way defective for having an opposing opinion to yours. The only thing you're doing is further dragging your author's name through the mud. That's not being a good fan.
Negative reviews will always exist. Some of them you might agree with even if you loved the book. Some of them might seem personal. Some of them might be so short you wonder if it can count as a review at all. They will always exist and regardless of how you personally feel about them, attacking them is not the answer. Ignore them. If you're the author or just a particularly devoted fan, rant privately to yourself and move on. Nothing good has ever come from commenting on a negative review. If Giffin's husband had ignored the original review to begin with, nobody would have blinked at this review. If anything, the average shopper probably would've just slid their eyes over it and moved on to the next review without really giving it a thought. It's not that in-depth of a review. It states why the reviewer didn't like it, but it's not like it goes into such detail that it'd stick out in your mind. Unless the reviewer dramatically edited their review down, which I very much doubt, there was nothing in the review that would constitute a personal attack on the author. Being a new reviewer and stating that the recent books have disappointed you does not mean that they're doing this to slight the author in the least.
UPDATE 4: THE UPDATENING
I just found an apology written by the author's husband. (Click here to go straight to it) Like the last time I posted his words, I'm posting them straight from the source "as is":
I do understand to a degree. I also want to say that if someone has been badgering the author and extremely harassing the author beyond the usual internet chatter, that's not cool. I'm not sure if Mr. Giffin's idea of harassment is the same as mine, but if they were going around from place to place with the intent of hurting the author emotionally or physically then I can understand being a little jumpy. (On a side note, I do believe that people can discuss an author's merits or the lack thereof in their work on multiple forums without that actually constituting harassment. I also don't think that posting reviews in multiple places is harassment either. I don't know what was being done, but I wanted to be a little clear on what I don't consider harassment. If you want to see what I do consider harassment, just google "Christian Weston Chandler" and you'll see true harassment of an individual.)
In any case, we can keep talking about how the husband should have known better, how his public persona can damage his wife's rep as much as her actions could, how nobody would've known about the review if he'd never posted on the review in the first place or if Giffin herself had decided not to comment on it three days later, or any number of things. It's done at this point and we can't really change it. I can only hope that the Giffins have learned a lesson from this, that it's never a good idea to go off on a reviewer. It doesn't matter what slights you think they might have done or if you think that the reviewer is someone who has been harassing you. There are very, very few situations where an author will come out of a situation like this looking good. I know it might not seem fair that authors don't have as much freedom to respond to negative reviews of any type, but they also have more to lose from responding because it's so easy for responses to be taken so many different ways and end up costing you reputation or fans. If the person writing the review truly is being inappropriate, report the review. (And be aware that just as your response can be interpreted differently by others, you might be interpreting the review in a different light than the reviewer intended.) If a person truly is trying to sling barbs or harass you, the worst and I repeat worst thing you can do is give them the attention they're seeking. None of the reviews I've seen so far were written to harass or slander, so I don't want people thinking that I view any of these reviews as bad. I'm just giving general advice for anyone that might read this. Sometimes the best thing to do is just walk away and take the high road.
UPDATE 5: THE FINAL UPDATE (hopefully)
I noticed I made STGRB. I was wondering when that'd happen. In any case, the one thing I want to specify from that site is that I never specifically said that Giffin told her fans to downvote anyone. I just said that she's intelligent enough to know what would inevitably happen if she pointed out any negative review or her husband's actions online. Let's put it this way: if you put a piece of candy next to a hungry, candy-loving toddler, the toddler will eat the candy. We'd all like to think that the toddler would leave the candy alone and would simply look at it, but the kid just wouldn't be able to help themselves and they'd assume that your whole reason for leaving the candy next to them was because you wanted them to eat it, regardless of whether or not you said anything. The same premise applies here. If your husband comments on a negative review and you make a post on facebook that even remotely looks like you're putting his comment in a positive light, people are going to assume that not only did you feel like his actions are OK, but that the best way to get your approval is to downvote and post comments themselves. Even if Giffin did only intend for people to look, past events with other authors and similar scenarios have shown that fans will go after anything they feel is an attack against an author or anything that the author or their people feel is an attack. At some point you can't cry ignorance over this because so many of these scenarios have been so incredibly public and very, very painful for pretty much all of the people involved.
It was bad manners for Giffin's husband to post what he did. But it was incredibly foolish for Giffin to post about that review on various social media sites. She's not a silly woman. Giffin has graduated with a law degree and has traveled the world. As such, I'd imagine that she's fairly aware of what her actions could lead to in any given situation and I don't think this situation is much different. If she truly and completely never intended for any of her fans to go out and harass someone, then I do apologize for saying anything different. But I just don't entirely believe that. That's my personal opinion on the matter and not fact, but you've got to figure that with all of the various fusses over authors replying to public reviews and news sites of varying degrees of importance reporting on this over the years, she'd know better and know what could happen in a situation like this. I'd just really like to believe that someone who went through law school, represented various people in court, and writes about "real life" situations would have more common sense than this. But since I can't prove this, again I'll state that this is just my personal opinion. There was just no point to her posting about the negative review and given that her husband had posted on the review about two to three days before she ever put a post on facebook about it, there was plenty of time for the comment to have been removed and for Giffin to look into what he was writing. (Hint: if anyone tells you that they're doing battle in your defense and you're a very public figure, ALWAYS look to see what they're writing because in the end it's your reputation that gets ruined.)
All I know is that she will likely never do this again. We can all only hope that maybe we won't have another author/reviewer drama from anyone on our hands for quite some time. I'd much rather post nice little blogs about various author successes than dramas.
Update #(dunno):
I was just given this screencap by Corey. Previously I'd said that Giffin had never actually posted anything that told people to comment or down vote reviews. Then I was showed this image. Most of the post was written by the assistant, but in the end she's still posting a comment that's telling people to go to the reviews and "defend her". That is a fairly loaded statement, to be honest. The only reason I'd heard about this in the first place was because a few other people had heard about this via her facebook page and saw that people were going over to attack Avid Reader. Maybe they just meant to go over and have a civil conversation, but considering that at this point the reading community was starting to implode on itself over the comments that were previously left, posting this is really not helping anything. Neither is consistently refusing to go and read what's going on. At this point with all of the things that have been said for her and about her, it'd probably be a good idea to know what's being said about her rather than hearing it all secondhand. You can't properly defend yourself if you don't know what's going on, after all.
I'll just say that after reading this, I'm actually starting to believe that Giffin is probably clueless enough to where she didn't think anyone would do anything other than read the review. Either she's being insanely passive aggressive or she's just insanely naive. I'm honestly not sure which would be worse. In either case, I really really recommend that she go through her agent or publicist as far as comments go because in one scenario she's passive aggressively sending people over to fight her battles. In the other she's being so clueless that she's almost a danger to herself. Either way, going through her agent or publicist for advice would probably have kept things from getting so pear shaped.
In any case, the above post is deleted off of the facebook account so hopefully things will eventually die down. Again, if anyone that wants to support Giffin is reading this and disagrees with any of what I've posted here or with any of the reviews, getting angry and nasty with the reviewers is not the answer. Support her by purchasing her books and leaving positive reviews for the books of hers that you've read. Post them in any venue you can find, whether it's Amazon, Goodreads, or wherever. That's how you support an author or at least how you should support an author. Not by calling and harassing people or leaving snippy comments in reviews, but by purchasing their stuff.
Update: The Final Frontier
Hi all! I just wanted to let you know that Corey has written up a blog post about her experiences with this, so I wanted to post this here and direct you all over there to read her experiences. She's pretty comprehensive about it all, so if you want another take on the matter and all of what's happened to her in such a short period of time, I definitely recommend reading it.
Today's ABB is actually a husband behaving badly. Maybe not "Candace Sams is calling the FBI bad", but it's pretty abhorrent behavior for any author, let alone a professional one.
Author Emily Giffin recently received a one star rating on her book Where We Belong, which released last month. The review read as follows: (click here to go straight to the review)
This book was so disappointing. I have read all of Emily Giffin's books, and have found that her last few books are getting worse and worse. Where We Belong had the ability to be a great story. However, telling the story from two points of view, Marianne and Kirby, led there to be little depth to either character. Also I found both characters to be very unlikable. The story was trite and unbelievable. I also found that Giffin put a very negative spin on adoption. Giffin's last books have been a disappointment and this one was no different.
A little light, but overall it's not some angry missive where the reviewer is just slinging bile. It's one of the more mild negative reviews I've seen out there and I've seen some reviews that completely rip a novel to shreds and use it as kitty litter. (Not that those kinds of reviews are wrong, just that people can and have been more harsh in their criticisms of things.) The reviewer did at least try to state why they didn't like the book.
That's where Giffin's husband stepped in. I'm posting the following exchange "as is".
Initial post: Aug 13, 2012 3:06:35 PM PDT
a
Really? An "avid reader" that has written one review in their entire existence on amazon. Beware people. Psycho alert.
In reply to an earlier post on Aug 19, 2012 9:46:54 PM PDT
Last edited by the author on Aug 19, 2012 9:56:49 PM PDT
Last edited by the author on Aug 19, 2012 9:56:49 PM PDT
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What an incredibly petty and mean comment, Emily Giffin. And you must have forgotten that by clicking on "a reader from ATL" we see your signed diatribe against another author who's unfortunate enough to share your name. And now you're calling someone a "psycho" simply because she didn't like your book? Jeez. What a horrible human being you seem to be.
Since you'll probably delete your comment once you realize you've been caught insulting a reader who didn't like your book, I'll do others a favor and post your comment here:
"a reader from ATL says:
Really? An "avid reader" that has written one review in their entire existence on amazon. Beware people. Psycho alert."
Classy, huh?
Since you'll probably delete your comment once you realize you've been caught insulting a reader who didn't like your book, I'll do others a favor and post your comment here:
"a reader from ATL says:
Really? An "avid reader" that has written one review in their entire existence on amazon. Beware people. Psycho alert."
Classy, huh?
In reply to an earlier post on Aug 21, 2012 6:31:01 PM PDT
UES, I'm not Emily Giffin. I'm her husband. I see the link you're referring to and I suppose when that issue came up Emily responded from my computer. My issue is this - anybody is entitled to express their opinion and I don't want to ever discourage that. But I get sick of seeing these posts by jokers who have never reviewed a book and write a one line, one star review because they have some other issue. You, in fact, use some pretty hateful language yourself. I was merely sticking up for my wife who, as a matter of course, doesn't read the reviews on here. If somebody hates the book then fine but some of these are not objective reviews.
In reply to an earlier post on Aug 21, 2012 6:53:47 PM PDT
I truly am an "avid reader" of Emily Giffin (love her books!) but I am also the daughter of a restaurant owner. On behalf of my father, I check reviews daily, and oftentimes find myself wanting to reply in defense. Of course I agree that everyone is entitled to an opinion; however, it's extremely frustrating to read reviews from people who review out of spite, hatred, or some other personal reason rather than write an educated, unbiased review. Props to Emily's husband for recognizing a lame reviewer and sticking up for his wife! :)
Posted on Aug 21, 2012 7:18:34 PM PDT
I've read all of Emily Giffin's books and love them all. My only complaint (or rather, wish) is that she has more books published!
Posted on Aug 21, 2012 7:20:39 PM PDT
Can I just point out that "avid reader" did not even spell the main character's name right?? Further proof he/she did not read it. After seeing her name so many times on the pages that mistake stuck out to me like a sore thumb! And good for you, Mr. Giffin, I love to see a husband stick up for his wife and I truly believe it was warranted!
In reply to an earlier post on Aug 21, 2012 7:30:50 PM PDT
Bravo to you, Emilys Husband, for sticking up for your Wife!:) I have not had the privilege of reading this one, but if anything like her others, then I'm sure it's wonderful!:)
Posted on Aug 21, 2012 7:38:06 PM PDT
I too think it's wonderful that you're sticking up for your wife Mr. Giffin :) and like the others have said before me; unbiased reviews are hard to come by. I am an avid reviewer of all life experiences. I haven't yet had a chance to read WWB yet but I plan to, because I've read and love all of Emily's other books. Sometimes reviews have to be taken with a grain of salt and it's a shame that people take the time out of their lives to be so negative and hurtful. Karma is a b****.
Posted on Aug 21, 2012 7:41:52 PM PDT
Did you read the same book? Negative spin on adoption? Unlikable characters? It was believable to me! I loved it, I just wish there was more for us to read! Part 2 please?! :-)
Posted on Aug 21, 2012 8:11:15 PM PDT
"UES" why all the hostility? I also read Emily's response to finding her name associated with the "erotica" writings of the other Emily Giffin, and I thought her response was intelligent, appropriate, and free from the harsh spin that you have put on your review - hardly a "diatribe", as it is not insluting, harsh, or even negative at all. Perhaps its time to start reading the dictionary.
Classy, huh?
To "Mr. Giffin" kudos to you. I am also one of Emily's facebook friends who is here to support her. I loved the alternating points of view - only hoping to see one from Conrad along the way. I found the story believable, as one of my sisters gave a baby up for adoption at 16, and another one of my sisters has two beautiful adopted daughters. My third sister is EXACTLY the type of person to take someone shopping as a way of calming herself, and feeling like she is in her own elementas she tries to will an awkward or uncomfortable situation away.
Classy, huh?
To "Mr. Giffin" kudos to you. I am also one of Emily's facebook friends who is here to support her. I loved the alternating points of view - only hoping to see one from Conrad along the way. I found the story believable, as one of my sisters gave a baby up for adoption at 16, and another one of my sisters has two beautiful adopted daughters. My third sister is EXACTLY the type of person to take someone shopping as a way of calming herself, and feeling like she is in her own elementas she tries to will an awkward or uncomfortable situation away.
There is no excuse for coming on and attacking a reviewer like this, calling them a "psycho" because they only have one review to their name. All that could mean is that this reader felt so strongly about this book that they decided to leave a review. It's fairly common and guess what? It means that at one point that reader was such a big fan of Giffin's work that the letdown to them was that much more of an impact. It doesn't make her "psycho" at all.
Now you'll notice that there's a huge lag time between responses. Why is that? It's because about three hours ago (8/21/12) Giffin posted about the review on her facebook account, bragging about her husband's actions on facebook.
She pretty much acknowledges that her husband went onto Amazon and then attacked a negative review. She then posts a link to the Amazon entry with a comment about where the review is located on her facebook page, which pretty much sends out the message of "go downvote this review and comment yourself". This is why most of the comments are so recent.
Now if this had been a particularly venomous review, I could almost understand the temptation to post. It's hard to see someone talk smack about something someone you know or love wrote. But this wasn't a bad review. The reviewer said nothing about the author, just that they were disappointed with the book and had been disappointed with the books for a while. And they got attacked because of it and labeled a "psycho" because they dared voice their opinions and was a new reviewer to Amazon.
His statement of "not wanting to discourage opinions" is pretty invalid considering that he took to Amazon to insult someone who was simply voicing their own opinion in a free forum of their choosing. His only justification is that the reviewer didn't have a five paragraph review and a twenty page history of product plugs. Where's his indignation for the positive reviewers who posted a 1-3 sentence brief five star review and not much (if any) of a purchase history on Amazon? Why isn't he angry that people are taking to Amazon to post reviews that are more skimpy than the negative one? (And yes, there are reviewers who left positive reviews prior to the negative one's posting that have just a few sentences and have only reviewed this one book.)
What's even worse are the people on facebook and on the Amazon review defending Giffin's husband's actions. Why is it that posting a negative review is "psycho" but someone searching out reviews, insulting reviewers, and then sending out a cattle call for everyone to go gawk at the negative review (thus ensuring they'll downvote and bully the reviewer) isn't? I do acknowledge that Giffin only tells people to read the review, but come on... what does she expect them to do? They want to support their author and keep her happy, so they do what they think she'd like them to do: attack and downvote the review. I'm sure that Giffin would probably deny this, but she didn't get to where she is in the world by being an idiot. She knows full well what happens when authors send their readers to negative reviews. There's been enough stories about the aftermath of this, after all. Besides, a follow up post shows her husband grinning over the review's bombardment on Amazon, so again- she is probably fairly aware of what the end result of such actions are, even if she didn't personally read any of the comments.
So seriously authors, don't do this. I wasn't a fan of Giffin to begin with, but this pretty much cements that I'll never pick up one of her books again and I won't be buying any as gifts for anyone else. I'm not going to tell you not to read her books, but I will warn you that if you post a negative review you'll run the risk of being insulted by her husband or Giffin for your troubles.
Now they'll probably consider me psycho for posting screencaps of all of this, but stuff like this has a tendency to disappear from the internet when the authors and family members realize that not everyone is so approving of the whole "sling a reviewer, hold them up to your fans for target practice" thing. I know that this is Giffin's husband that attacked the reviewer, but Giffin's actions show that she's fairly aware of what's going on. And again, with all of the author fiascoes going on with both well known and indie authors, there's no way that she could be so clueless as to not be aware of how badly this would be received in the general literary world.
UPDATE:
I did a quick Twitter check and sure enough, she posted it to Twitter as well. Seriously Giffin, bad move. That is a tasteless, classless thing to do to someone who took the time out of their daily life to read your books. It might hurt that they didn't like it, but you and your husband should have taken the high road and simply not responded at all. That you decided to brag about your husband's bad behavior, ensuring that more people would know about it and hound the reviewer (and thus drawing attention to said bad behavior by your husband) is pretty much encouraging bullying. I honestly thought you better than that.
So authors, if you see someone you know (husband, friend, etc) posting on Amazon or any other review forum in response to a negative review, your reaction should be to snatch the keyboard out of their hands and try to do damage control as quickly as possible. If possible, delete the comments and stay away from the kerfuffle. And above all else, do NOT post about it on your facebook page with glowing comments about your husband attacking a reviewer. (And make no bones about it, what your husband did was an attack. The reader purchased your book via Amazon, didn't like it, then posted a review. It's valid and he had no business calling them names and accusing their review of being a slight against you as an author.) You know full well that it's just endorsing an attack on the review. Negative reviews happen. Sometimes they can get incredibly personal and insulting. This was not one of them.
UPDATE 2:
I've seen where a reviewer (Corey A Doyle) on Amazon has changed their review rating because of how the whole Giffin scenario affected them. I'm a little leery of this this since you've always got to be incredibly careful of changing ratings after the fact as well as talking about the whole author thing in the review, as talking about authors in review spaces sort of paints a tempting target on your back. In any case, I see where Giffin's assistant has commented on Corey's review. (Click here to go to the review.) I'm posting this verbatim from Amazon:
In reply to an earlier post on Aug 22, 2012 1:56:04 PM PDT
I'm Emily's assistant, Kate. Shame on you for changing your review from FIVE STARS to ONE STAR b/c of something personal. As a vine reviewer, you know that isn't even allowed by Amazon. If your review was FIVE stars when you read the book, why should it be ONE now b/c you don't like something she or her husband did??? Her husband was defending her against an unfair, personal attack, like the ones above. Her husband is human and gets upset when people upset her...
As for the rest of your accusations, you are just plain wrong. Emily is a wonderful person--she shared with you how she felt about not reaching her goal to be #1 in on facebook. It was a sweet, heartfelt, honest post... Here it is:
"On my way to Naperville for my hometown signing. I have to admit to you guys--I'm really, really disappointed and sad not to have broken the Buffalo Bills spell... especially because I believed that based on the numbers/sales figures all week, that this book would be #1.... That said, i also want to say that I would rather have your support and love and kind words than a dozen number ones...."
So clearly, she never blamed anyone or criticized another author. Why can't she be honest about her feelings ON HER OWN FACEBOOK PAGE? In addition, she has been told by hundreds of girls and every manager at every bookstore she has ever visited how kind she is. She came back from an exhausting tour and did everything she could to be nice to so many. She has sent literally hundreds of free things to people on her own dime.... How dare you all say these personal things about her?? This is her passion and her career and she doesn't deserve to have your unfair thoughts about her reflect on her work.
As for the rest of your accusations, you are just plain wrong. Emily is a wonderful person--she shared with you how she felt about not reaching her goal to be #1 in on facebook. It was a sweet, heartfelt, honest post... Here it is:
"On my way to Naperville for my hometown signing. I have to admit to you guys--I'm really, really disappointed and sad not to have broken the Buffalo Bills spell... especially because I believed that based on the numbers/sales figures all week, that this book would be #1.... That said, i also want to say that I would rather have your support and love and kind words than a dozen number ones...."
So clearly, she never blamed anyone or criticized another author. Why can't she be honest about her feelings ON HER OWN FACEBOOK PAGE? In addition, she has been told by hundreds of girls and every manager at every bookstore she has ever visited how kind she is. She came back from an exhausting tour and did everything she could to be nice to so many. She has sent literally hundreds of free things to people on her own dime.... How dare you all say these personal things about her?? This is her passion and her career and she doesn't deserve to have your unfair thoughts about her reflect on her work.
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42 of 103 people think this post adds to the discussion. Do you? 
42 of 103 people think this post adds to the discussion. Do you?
I can see where one could argue that the #1 post wasn't that bad. I can understand complaining about that to a degree, as I'm sure that it is fairly disappointing to get so close to the first spot and not achieve it. That I'm not really going to criticize any as that's not really behaving bad as much as it's an overachiever thing.
What bothers me is that the assistant saw the original review, the one that started all of this, as a personal attack and that the husband was justified. It was not a personal attack against the author. I can't stress this enough. The review was just an ordinary, average reviewer stating his or her reasons as to why they disliked the book and that they'd been disappointed with the books for a while. That is not a personal attack. A personal attack would be if the reviewer had said something along the lines of "Giffin is just stuck up and thinks she's too good to eat her vegetables, she's the anti-christ" or something like that. That's a personal attack and if the original reviewer (AvidReader) had said something like that in their review, I'd agree whole heartedly that it would be an attack. But they didn't state anything like this.
I also don't think that charity work excuses awful behavior or condoning her husband going on line and picking at reviewers. She could have given a kidney to a sick child, but that doesn't mean that she or her husband have the right to attack reviews. That's just not appropriate and being an otherwise good person does not mean that after you give out 100 books your husband gets to call a reviewer names while you extol his virtues online and brag about it. That's like saying that after I finish feeding the homeless I get to swipe a dollar from the offering plate at church.
The assistant also claims that Giffin never slammed another author. That's nice and I encourage Giffin to not slam another author. But this is different. This is Giffin's husband slamming a reviewer and Giffin indirectly encouraging her fans to go titter at the remarks and downvote the review. I say indirectly, but any time you link to a negative review you're pretty much full on endorsing an attack on a negative review. There's no getting around this fact and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that you're painting a target on a person who is not a professional, bought your book with their own money, and then decided to take their time to write a review. This is actually a little worse than slamming another author because this was a comment to one of your fans. You know, the people who buy your books, pay your salary, and put you where you were? That's biting the hand that feeds you and regardless of how many hands you have coming your way, it's incredibly nasty to accuse someone of being a psycho just because they wrote a negative review.
UPDATE 3:
I was just informed in the comments that Corey has received harassing phone calls, getting one where someone told her to go kill herself.
Seriously, what is wrong with some people? I don't know if anyone who called her has or is reading this, but seriously, that's not cool. Now if we want to bandy about the term "psycho" then this is a situation where it would apply. Corey changed her vote rating based upon her personal feelings. I might not necessarily be 100% comfortable with it, but it's her personal freedom and right to do as she pleases with her review. It's her review and she can do whatever she wants with it. If she wants to recite the National Anthem backwards then that's her prerogative to do so. It might not be what I'd write, but guess what? It's not my review and I have no right to tell her what she can or can't say. Neither, might I add, does anyone else, regardless of what your personal feelings might be.
Where the line gets drawn is when you have someone taking the time to track down someone's personal information, call them, and tell them to go kill themselves. Let me repeat that: someone feels that Corey should die because she *gasp* changed her mind on a review and gave it one star. Not because she's done a Casey Anthony or because she stole from a million orphans, but because she wrote a review that someone didn't agree with.
So guys, that's not cool. Actually, I'm fairly sure that there's probably harassment laws created specifically against this sort of thing. You are not being a good fan by calling Casey and telling her to "go kill herself". If you really want to support Giffin despite the actions of her and her husband, then do so with your wallet. Buy her books. If you enjoyed them, leave her positive reviews. That's how you support an author. Not by calling people and harassing them. Not by bombarding reviews and saying nasty things to them like "you only read Harlequins, this book must be too advanced for you" or insinuating that they're in any way defective for having an opposing opinion to yours. The only thing you're doing is further dragging your author's name through the mud. That's not being a good fan.
Negative reviews will always exist. Some of them you might agree with even if you loved the book. Some of them might seem personal. Some of them might be so short you wonder if it can count as a review at all. They will always exist and regardless of how you personally feel about them, attacking them is not the answer. Ignore them. If you're the author or just a particularly devoted fan, rant privately to yourself and move on. Nothing good has ever come from commenting on a negative review. If Giffin's husband had ignored the original review to begin with, nobody would have blinked at this review. If anything, the average shopper probably would've just slid their eyes over it and moved on to the next review without really giving it a thought. It's not that in-depth of a review. It states why the reviewer didn't like it, but it's not like it goes into such detail that it'd stick out in your mind. Unless the reviewer dramatically edited their review down, which I very much doubt, there was nothing in the review that would constitute a personal attack on the author. Being a new reviewer and stating that the recent books have disappointed you does not mean that they're doing this to slight the author in the least.
UPDATE 4: THE UPDATENING
I just found an apology written by the author's husband. (Click here to go straight to it) Like the last time I posted his words, I'm posting them straight from the source "as is":
Posted on Aug 22, 2012 6:37:08 PM PDT
Hello all. This is Emily's husband. i just want to officially go on record as apologizing to "avid reader", Corey Doyle and anyone else I offended by commenting on a review. This is not an excuse for my actions, but only an explanation: For weeks Emily has been harassed by one person on the internet. When I looked up "avid reader" and saw that he had only ever reviewed ONE book in his life--and it was a one star of WHERE WE BELONG--i jumped to a conclusion that this was the same person and acted in hasty emotion. Although I regret the post and the language I used, I'm sure any of you who love someone and feel protective of them might understand my actions. She put two years and her heart in this book, and I hate to think that anyone would review her work based on anything other the merits. I also hate to think that my ill-conceived defense of Emily would hurt her further. Also, for the record, Emily had no idea the actual content of the exchange when she posted on Facebook. She doesn't read Amazon reviews, and she thought this was harmless banter because that is how i presented it to her. And because I'm not on Facebook, I didn't know what she had posted. Please accept my apology. You can continue to discuss if you wish, but I am bowing out, along with Kate, Emily's assistant who was also just trying to defend a good person. We encourage everyone to post honest reviews of the book, whether good, bad or the ever-insightful mixed.
In any case, we can keep talking about how the husband should have known better, how his public persona can damage his wife's rep as much as her actions could, how nobody would've known about the review if he'd never posted on the review in the first place or if Giffin herself had decided not to comment on it three days later, or any number of things. It's done at this point and we can't really change it. I can only hope that the Giffins have learned a lesson from this, that it's never a good idea to go off on a reviewer. It doesn't matter what slights you think they might have done or if you think that the reviewer is someone who has been harassing you. There are very, very few situations where an author will come out of a situation like this looking good. I know it might not seem fair that authors don't have as much freedom to respond to negative reviews of any type, but they also have more to lose from responding because it's so easy for responses to be taken so many different ways and end up costing you reputation or fans. If the person writing the review truly is being inappropriate, report the review. (And be aware that just as your response can be interpreted differently by others, you might be interpreting the review in a different light than the reviewer intended.) If a person truly is trying to sling barbs or harass you, the worst and I repeat worst thing you can do is give them the attention they're seeking. None of the reviews I've seen so far were written to harass or slander, so I don't want people thinking that I view any of these reviews as bad. I'm just giving general advice for anyone that might read this. Sometimes the best thing to do is just walk away and take the high road.
UPDATE 5: THE FINAL UPDATE (hopefully)
I noticed I made STGRB. I was wondering when that'd happen. In any case, the one thing I want to specify from that site is that I never specifically said that Giffin told her fans to downvote anyone. I just said that she's intelligent enough to know what would inevitably happen if she pointed out any negative review or her husband's actions online. Let's put it this way: if you put a piece of candy next to a hungry, candy-loving toddler, the toddler will eat the candy. We'd all like to think that the toddler would leave the candy alone and would simply look at it, but the kid just wouldn't be able to help themselves and they'd assume that your whole reason for leaving the candy next to them was because you wanted them to eat it, regardless of whether or not you said anything. The same premise applies here. If your husband comments on a negative review and you make a post on facebook that even remotely looks like you're putting his comment in a positive light, people are going to assume that not only did you feel like his actions are OK, but that the best way to get your approval is to downvote and post comments themselves. Even if Giffin did only intend for people to look, past events with other authors and similar scenarios have shown that fans will go after anything they feel is an attack against an author or anything that the author or their people feel is an attack. At some point you can't cry ignorance over this because so many of these scenarios have been so incredibly public and very, very painful for pretty much all of the people involved.
It was bad manners for Giffin's husband to post what he did. But it was incredibly foolish for Giffin to post about that review on various social media sites. She's not a silly woman. Giffin has graduated with a law degree and has traveled the world. As such, I'd imagine that she's fairly aware of what her actions could lead to in any given situation and I don't think this situation is much different. If she truly and completely never intended for any of her fans to go out and harass someone, then I do apologize for saying anything different. But I just don't entirely believe that. That's my personal opinion on the matter and not fact, but you've got to figure that with all of the various fusses over authors replying to public reviews and news sites of varying degrees of importance reporting on this over the years, she'd know better and know what could happen in a situation like this. I'd just really like to believe that someone who went through law school, represented various people in court, and writes about "real life" situations would have more common sense than this. But since I can't prove this, again I'll state that this is just my personal opinion. There was just no point to her posting about the negative review and given that her husband had posted on the review about two to three days before she ever put a post on facebook about it, there was plenty of time for the comment to have been removed and for Giffin to look into what he was writing. (Hint: if anyone tells you that they're doing battle in your defense and you're a very public figure, ALWAYS look to see what they're writing because in the end it's your reputation that gets ruined.)
All I know is that she will likely never do this again. We can all only hope that maybe we won't have another author/reviewer drama from anyone on our hands for quite some time. I'd much rather post nice little blogs about various author successes than dramas.
Update #(dunno):
I was just given this screencap by Corey. Previously I'd said that Giffin had never actually posted anything that told people to comment or down vote reviews. Then I was showed this image. Most of the post was written by the assistant, but in the end she's still posting a comment that's telling people to go to the reviews and "defend her". That is a fairly loaded statement, to be honest. The only reason I'd heard about this in the first place was because a few other people had heard about this via her facebook page and saw that people were going over to attack Avid Reader. Maybe they just meant to go over and have a civil conversation, but considering that at this point the reading community was starting to implode on itself over the comments that were previously left, posting this is really not helping anything. Neither is consistently refusing to go and read what's going on. At this point with all of the things that have been said for her and about her, it'd probably be a good idea to know what's being said about her rather than hearing it all secondhand. You can't properly defend yourself if you don't know what's going on, after all.
I'll just say that after reading this, I'm actually starting to believe that Giffin is probably clueless enough to where she didn't think anyone would do anything other than read the review. Either she's being insanely passive aggressive or she's just insanely naive. I'm honestly not sure which would be worse. In either case, I really really recommend that she go through her agent or publicist as far as comments go because in one scenario she's passive aggressively sending people over to fight her battles. In the other she's being so clueless that she's almost a danger to herself. Either way, going through her agent or publicist for advice would probably have kept things from getting so pear shaped.
Update: The Final Frontier
Hi all! I just wanted to let you know that Corey has written up a blog post about her experiences with this, so I wanted to post this here and direct you all over there to read her experiences. She's pretty comprehensive about it all, so if you want another take on the matter and all of what's happened to her in such a short period of time, I definitely recommend reading it.
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