Fans rating a book wayyyyyyyyy before its release happens on Goodreads a lot, but authors rarely comment on it; especially when they are scoring primarily 5 stars such as Patrick Rothfuss does. Pat, however, has decided to address the kindhearted time travellers who are taking the time to rate his book 5/5 and ask them to email him a copy of it to save the copious amount of editing work he still has left to do before its release.
While it’s nice to see folks out there giving this book five stars, and in some cases even reviewing it, I’ll admit that I’m kinda puzzled.
After thinking it over for a while, I’ve realized there’s only one explanation for this:
Time travelers love my books.
This is strangely reassuring, as it lets me know that, eventually, I do finish my revisions, and the book turns out good enough so that I still have a following out there in the big ball of wibbly-wobbly…. timey-wimey…. stuff that I like to think of as the future.
I would also like to say, future readers, that I appreciate your taking time to read and review my books. It’s really flattering knowing that even with time-travel technology at your disposal, you’d rather read my stuff and mention it here on goodreads, rather than, say, hunt dinosaurs, get drunk with da Vinci, or pants Hitler.
Secondly, I’d like to say if you’re The Doctor, and you’re reading this, I would make an excellent traveling companion. I know you normally tend to hang out with pretty young women and robot dogs. And honestly? I respect that.
Still, I bring certain things to the table. Humor, witty banter, and a beard that will allow me to blend in seamlessly with any pre-industrial Germanic culture. I’m also an excellent kisser and play a mean game of Settlers of Catan.
Just throwing it out there.
Lastly, if any of you happen to have a digital copy of the book you’d like to e-mail me, I’d really appreciate it. I’d love to see the five-star version of the book, because right now, the one I’m toiling away at is about a three an a half-in my opinion. It would save me a lot of work if I could just skip to the end and publish it.
Sincerely yours,
pat
HA! What do you guys thinks of the trend to rate a book before its release? Harmless fun and a way to support an author or childish behaviour that makes a mockery of the scoring system? Additionally, how do you think it affects the author, if at all? Do you think it would give them confidence, anxiety it needs to be good (if high), anxiety they don’t have an appreciative fan-base (if low)?
Jennie Ivins
“childish behaviour that makes a mockery of the scoring system”, definitely!
Then again, I don’t score Goodreads-people highly, and that’s why I left :/
Love Patricks’ reply 🙂
Haha, same here. He truly is great entertainment as a person as well as an author 😉 All good for the genre.
Anything that disrupts the idiotic “star system” for works of art is to be lauded and appreciated. If someone could infiltrate and troll the awards as well, we might have something good going on.
That’s 15 bonus hipster points for Mr Splicer.
I am on GoodReads, and I will not give a book any kind of star rating until I have finished reading it.
While it’s fantastic that readers have this much faith in Pat, they’re probably going to feel more than a bit stupid if they read the book when it comes out and it’s not exactly as they expected it to be. Then again, it might be as good as they expected it to be, or better. And reviewing it? How is that even possible when it’s not released yet? I fully agree with Pat’s own post about that. What are they writing, reviews in the style of fan fiction?
I think, for me, it would be enough of a boost to my confidence as an author to have fans show their excitement and see them chattering away about what the next book might be like. I think people rating something highly before it’s even out would make me quite apprehensive, because I’d be worried they’d end up changing their minds, which would be a greater blow to my confidence and it would also add pressure I think. Why? Because when someone rates you at five stars when they haven’t even read the book, the author probably feels they’ve got so much to live up to and therefore it could add to the stress of endeavouring to then make sure their book is actually worth the five stars it’s been rated. I’m not a published author yet, but from my own point of view, that’s certainly how I’d feel.
I say you should never count your chickens before they’re hatched.
Awesome reply by Pat!
I think these people are doing it out of a misguided sense of loyalty to Pat and his books, and other authors they do it to, in order to up the rating before it can be trashed upon release. They don’t seem to release that it completely defeats the point of a review site, however, but I wouldn’t say it’s “harmless fun” or “childish behaviour” either, just a little naive. 🙂
And you’ve also got the people that read one book in a series and then rate every single other book the author puts out as a 1 because they didn’t like it, whether they’ve read it or it’s even out.