Following nicely along from yesterday’s post in which we saw a demonstration of how one particular writer seemed determined to shoot herself in both writerly feet, I was very pleased to read this morning of a different author getting things exactly right.
When Amanda Hocking won a charity auction recently and was sent a couple of lovely extras, she was thrilled. She blogged about how pleased she was; and in the comments thread to that post, someone pointed her to a negative review he’d written about one of her books (this link should take you direct to that comment but it’s worth reading your way down to it to see how out of place his comment was).
Amanda Hocking’s response to him was class in a bottle.
Not only is she a successful writer, she also has great style. Well done, Ms Hocking. I wish there were more people like you on the internet, and fewer people like your insistent reviewer.
I don’t understand why the reviewer felt the need to point her at his negative review of her book. It seems a very mean-spirited form of attention seeking and I can’t work out what he was expecting to achieve by it.
In contrast, Amanda Hocking’s response is very classy. Good for her.
Kath –
He’s rather (in)famous for stirring up trouble & getting banned from writing forums, etc. I believe he just got banned from AW for his less than acceptable behavior (yet again).
Responses like that make me want to rush out and buy the author’s books. In fact I did after a similar gracious response by Alex Scarrow on a less-than-positive review of his first Timeriders book (my 13-year old is now a sworn fan of his and has read the whole series).
The more I read about Amanda Hocking, the more I like her.
I hope I can be polite as that when someone tells me they do not like what I have written.
I find the way in which visitors interact in the comment section absolutely fascinating. The comments to which you provided a link were fairly tame, considering how rude they considered his actions. Visitors seem to fall into cliques, just like folks do face-to-face. The kind of cliques vary depending on the blog authors.
Comments on agent blogs tend to be positive and inane, except for a few who pop in anonymously to rant about how agents are strangling creativity, one manuscript at a time. It reminds me of a teenager throwing a cherry bomb in a mailbox and then hoofing it to a safe distance to watch the mayhem ensue.
Comments on author blogs look like they are a little more genuine and thoughtful. I agree that Amanda Hocking’s response was golden, and I believe she did avert an internet flame war.
What I thought was particularly fabulous a propos yesterday’s post was that, looking at the book’s Amazon ranking, it disproves the “all publicity is good publicity” adage.
And yes, Amanda is class in a glass. She loves cats too. There’s nothing not to like about her.
As you say – what a classy response. Grace under fire.
Bizarre that the reviewer thought it appropriate to place a book review – critical or otherwise – on a light post about a charity auction.
Nadia – thanks for letting me know he has ‘history’, as they say! How sad, even if it doesn’t come as a major surprise.
In the time since you wrote this post, the reviewer in question has started and already deleted another blog. The new blog’s mission was to keep reviewing books. None of the posts that were up on that blog were reviews. They were all condescending rants about other authors and reviewers online.
The only other site he lists right now does have actual reviews and shows none of the vitriol that predominated his other blog. Did he learn his lesson? Hopefully.
I realize that watching his site gave him attention he wanted, but probably didn’t deserve, but it was sort of like watching a dog juggle machetes. It had to be seen to be believed.