Reviews are starting to pop up for The Stepsister Scheme [Amazon | Mysterious Galaxy]. Most have been pretty darn positive. (I'm still bouncing over the Top Pick, 4.5-star review from Romantic Times :-) But as I've said before, no book will ever appeal to everyone, and there will be less positive reviews.

I read my first ... let's call it "lukewarm" review this morning. Then I re-read it. And then I went back a few minutes later and read it again. Which got me wondering why the negative hits us so much harder. I love the positive reviews I've gotten for Stepsister, but I don't go back and read them three times in an hour.

Back in my psych major days, I remember learning that it takes about 10 positive comments to counter the effects of a single negative. I couldn't recall the details, so I turned to trusty Google, who found this:

You see, a negative comment reverberates throughout our entire body because our body is made up of water, which absorbs both positive and negative comments and creates either rigid and spike like crystals when influenced by negative comments, or creates beautiful and symmetric crystals within the water's structure.

So there you go. The problem is that negative reviews are spikier in our water structure. Now you know! (ETA: Thanks to guinwhyte, we have an origin for the spiky water crystal thing.)

Anyway, I know part of my problem is that this is a new series. I've gotten a few negative reviews for the goblin books, but those books are better established. All three books have gone back for multiple printings, and they're still selling. Quest earned out its advance, and I suspect at least one of the other two books will do the same. Whereas Stepsister is brand new, so the stakes are much higher in my mind. I don't have that anchor of knowing the book has already achieved a certain level of "success," and thus my brain is loose to flail about like a 'roid raging muppet.

I don't think insecurity is an issue. There's always the danger of thinking, "What if they're right? What if this is really just a mediocre book?" But I don't believe that. If another 20 reviews pop up next week saying the same thing, maybe I'll reconsider, but right now the majority of the reviews have been positive. And more importantly, I believe this is a damn good book, with a lot of cool stuff. It's just that the cool stuff didn't work for this particular reviewer.

And I think that's closer to the heart of things. I feel like I let this reader down. Which is completely ridiculous of me, because there's no possible way to make every reader happy. Readers want different things from a book, and that's good. (IDIC, anyone?) But that doesn't change the fact that the most rewarding thing (for me) about being a writer is making that connection with the reader, having them read and fall in love with something I've written. A negative review means I've failed to do that. Fair? Nope. Rational? Not in the slightest. But ah well.

Finally, I have to remind myself that negative reviews aren't a bad thing. Heck, my reading list is brimming with reviews trashing Stephanie Meyer's work, and I'd be doing backflips if I could get a tenth of her sales.

Look at the reviews for Goblin War [Amazon | Mysterious Galaxy]. Amazon has almost all five-star reviews, and I don't remember finding a single negative review for that book. As wonderful as that is for my ego, it's not necessarily a good thing for the book. I know that no book will appeal to everyone, which suggests maybe this book hasn't done a good job of getting beyond my core readers and fans. I also know it's the best of the three goblin books, which helps, but if it was really reaching a wider audience, I'd expect a more mixed reaction. Because let's face it, not everyone loves nose-picking injuries and cannibalism humor as much as I do.

This is a new book, and a new series. There's some humor, but it's a more serious book than the goblin stuff. Some readers will appreciate that, while others will be disappointed*. I'm by no means a big name, but I'm more widely known than I was two years ago when DAW published my first goblin book. More people will see and read this book, which means a wider range of reactions. The only way it's going to get all positive reviews is if nobody buys it except for those core fans who already know they'll like it. I'm far better off with a book that reaches a larger audience, even though a (hopefully small) portion of that audience will be disappointed. (If you're a hardcore Gor fan, I can tell you right now that you'll probably fall into the "disappointed" category.)

I still want everyone to love it, of course. I'll still grumble and argue (silently) with the bad reviews. But I do appreciate them, and I'm grateful that this person took the time to read and review my work. Positive and negative reviews can both sell books, and they're both a heck of a lot better than silence.

Even if the negative reviews make my water crystals all spiky.

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*I'm going to be very interested to see if there's any correlation between the positive/negative reviews and the gender of the reviewer. So far it's too small a sample to say anything.