Reedsy Discovery - Discover and showcase the best new indie books

I hope you like the review you get, because if not--TOUGH! You have to live with your review, even if you are unhappy and it does nothing to help you out as a struggling author! They will NOT remove a review and it doesn't matter how unhappy you are! They care more about their amateur reviewers than their PAYING authors! They cleave to their beloved policies even if it means angering their customers! They will NOT help you out if you have a problem. Once you get a review, it's there forever! Even if you delete your book(s) and account, your review will stay on their site. Why? Who knows! I guess they care more about themselves and making their site look a little less empty than taking care of their customers. This is a BIG risk, people! Save your $50!

$50 for a half baked review. Vet your reviewers better if you intend to appear as though you do editorials. Right now, most of the reviews are on par with random readers on Goodreads. People want to improve their writing, not flush $50 away.

I have never attacked an editorial review of my work until now. Reedsy's lack of reviewer vetting is to blame. Since Reedsy refuses to act in the best interest of their clients, they leave me with no other option but to post this response. Let me level set with a bit of history. My most recent reviewer did not like my first book either. As an editorial review, her review of the first novel seemed harsh. So much so that I viewed it as a consumer review, not a professional editorial review. Other reviews for the novel were solid, and it was a top-10 seller in Time Travel Sci-Fi on Amazon. When I posted my next novel to Reedsy Discovery, the same reviewer *immediately* picked it up. This seemed odd considering the prior encounter. How many times do you want to read a book from an author you rated average? So, I questioned the "support" group, which is just a lady named Felicia. She said it wasn't uncommon for a reviewer to pick up another book from an author they liked. I highlighted they did not like my first book, having given it three stars, and rightfully wondered why the interest in picking up my second? I told her I would prefer another reviewer. No response or mitigation. A month later, the two-star review emerged about six weeks before the new novel launch date. I expressed my displeasure at the predictable outcome and requested removal of the review. Of course, Reedsy declined from their mighty perch and refused to admit any errors—unacceptable and why I will not be using the service again. However, the reasons we have arrived here are laughable when considering the reviewer's qualifications and the background development leading to this novel. First, this reviewer is not qualified to write editorial reviews. She is a heavy equipment operator from Canada and an artist on the side who has never published a novel. This is from her old website bio: "Who am I? Well, my name is ____, and I spend my days working towards my Heavy Equipment Technician ticket." She also teaches leather sewing and does some illustrations for clients and wants to start a robotics company? I appreciate anyone exploring multiple roles and their creative side, but this flies in the face of reason. They claim to vet reviewers… this is a joke. Second, this novel has a long history and wasn't a first draft slapped together in a month. It started as a screenplay that I workshopped extensively with multiple producers in Atlanta and Los Angeles. I converted it to a novel with the help of a developmental editor. My father—a retired career USMC avionics chief—reviewed the operations components. He speaks plainly and reads military espionage regularly. He would have never advised me to publish if "observational oversights" existed. It seems this artist with 14 Twitter followers really found gaps the old Marine missed. It is an insult to me and my family's extensive history of military service. As a closing statement, my NetGalley reviews for this novel are at four stars. I know it will rate about four stars across the board. It is commercial fiction meant to be a fast, fun, eye-popping read. I don't pretend I'm the best writer in the world. However, the reviewer has sadly gone the consumer review route and not fulfilled her duties as an editorial reviewer. She doesn't like my writing style and took issue with perceived gaps and decided on a rating. That's fine for a consumer, but Reedsy needs to quality check their editorial reviewers instead of just taking my money. This was an offensive experience from start to finish and I hope no other author gets subjected to it. Fortunately, I think that is the case, since this reviewer states on her website she won't be writing book reviews any longer. Regrettably, I got to experience two of them.

Amazing illustrations and highly usable website. All the best guys. The team has high attention to detail and i believe you will make this big. And, as an author can i limit how many users are going to review the book?

This is the definition of catching the simpleton. If you're a new indie author, stay away from this service. You may think this will help you launch your book but they will just take your 50 bucks and call it a day. The first thing you should consider is--if you go for Reedsy, you need to go full ham. Take their editors, their formatters, their everything otherwise they will burn you down. That's dishonest, but I guess it's the business world. I didn't get one of their editors and preferred to get someone outside of their platform and they *do* have a box you gotta tick when asking for a review. They *do* want to know if your book was edited by one of them or not. Secondly, when you pay for the review, you don't even know who your reviewer is going to be. There is 0 transparency on that. You're hiring someone blindly. They just send you an e-mail telling you your book has been picked up. Last, the reviewer is not a professional. I wrote an adult, dark fantasy novel and I was assigned a young adult fantasy romance reader. Why? Because in their bio, the reviewer said they read fantasy and apparently, that's enough for Reedsy. I checked the reviewer's site and social media, and they're a legit nobody like you and me, with no credentials other than "I read a lot of books." Yeah, me too, that doesn't make me an editorial reviewer. The review in question was awful--biased, offensive for no reason, and you could tell the reviewer didn't read the book at all because no plot points were ever mentioned, no characters, nothing that would constitute an "editorial" review. They complained about a lack of trigger warnings when those warnings were in the description; they used sentences like "I was screaming" to describe their reading... Fun fact, the reviewer bashed me for using the passive voice to describe actions, when the passive voice is meant to put emphasis on the action and not on the subject performing the action. These guys don't know what they're talking about, and the Reedsy staff can't be bothered to acknowledge it. Their ToS means nothing because even if you get a reviewer who writes, "I don't know who can enjoy this book," they think it's professional enough. They will tell you the review belongs to the reviewer so they can't take it down, like on Goodreads or Amazon. But the difference is, on Goodreads you don't pay people to give you their professional opinion. It's a reader website. And on Amazon, you can report abuse but even if you got a bad review, the person probably purchased your book anyway. They're customers. Again, not professionals. And I don't know what this load of excuses is anyway; on BookLife you can decide whether you want your review to be public or not. It should also be noted that even if you are somewhat satisfied with your review, it's up to you if you want your book to be featured in their newsletter. You've got to have a lot of people upvoting your review so basically, you have to market inside of Reedsy--pay someone for a launch and do the launch yourself is what this is. I also think there is a privacy issue with this platform because even after I deleted my account, I keep receiving notifications from Reedsy Discovery as if my account was half-active still. I e-mailed them maybe three times to solve this issue. Do they care? Of course not. Imagine uploading your manuscripts on such websites.

I have never attacked an editorial review of my work until now. Reedsy's lack of reviewer vetting is to blame. Since Reedsy refuses to act in the best interest of their clients, they leave me with no other option but to post this response. Let me level set with a bit of history. My most recent reviewer did not like my first book either. As an editorial review, her review of the first novel seemed harsh. So much so that I viewed it as a consumer review, not a professional editorial review. Other reviews for the novel were solid, and it was a top-10 seller in Time Travel Sci-Fi on Amazon. When I posted my next novel to Reedsy Discovery, the same reviewer *immediately* picked it up. This seemed odd considering the prior encounter. How many times do you want to read a book from an author you rated average? So, I questioned the "support" group, which is just a lady named Felicia. She said it wasn't uncommon for a reviewer to pick up another book from an author they liked. I highlighted they did not like my first book, having given it three stars, and rightfully wondered why the interest in picking up my second? I told her I would prefer another reviewer. No response or mitigation. A month later, the two-star review emerged about six weeks before the new novel launch date. I expressed my displeasure at the predictable outcome and requested removal of the review. Of course, Reedsy declined from their mighty perch and refused to admit any errors—unacceptable and why I will not be using the service again. However, the reasons we have arrived here are laughable when considering the reviewer's qualifications and the background development leading to this novel. First, this reviewer is not qualified to write editorial reviews. She is a heavy equipment operator from Canada and an artist on the side who has never published a novel. This is from her old website bio: "Who am I? Well, my name is ____, and I spend my days working towards my Heavy Equipment Technician ticket." She also teaches leather sewing and does some illustrations for clients and wants to start a robotics company? I appreciate anyone exploring multiple roles and their creative side, but this flies in the face of reason. They claim to vet reviewers… this is a joke. Second, this novel has a long history and wasn't a first draft slapped together in a month. It started as a screenplay that I workshopped extensively with multiple producers in Atlanta and Los Angeles. I converted it to a novel with the help of a developmental editor. My father—a retired career USMC avionics chief—reviewed the operations components. He speaks plainly and reads military espionage regularly. He would have never advised me to publish if "observational oversights" existed. It seems this artist with 14 Twitter followers really found gaps the old Marine missed. It is an insult to me and my family's extensive history of military service. As a closing statement, my NetGalley reviews for this novel are at four stars. I know it will rate about four stars across the board. It is commercial fiction meant to be a fast, fun, eye-popping read. I don't pretend I'm the best writer in the world. However, the reviewer has sadly gone the consumer review route and not fulfilled her duties as an editorial reviewer. She doesn't like my writing style and took issue with perceived gaps and decided on a rating. That's fine for a consumer, but Reedsy needs to quality check their editorial reviewers instead of just taking my money. This was an offensive experience from start to finish and I hope no other author gets subjected to it. Fortunately, I think that is the case, since this reviewer states on her website she won't be writing book reviews any longer. Regrettably, I got to experience two of them.