What I really like is an intelligent review. It doesn't have to be positive. A review that has some kind of insight, and sometimes people say something that's startling or is so poignant.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
A great review is great. A bad review is the worst.
What I do find enormously gratifying is the reviews my books get from the American press. They are so on the ball compared to anywhere else. It's so satisfying to get a review that conveys the reader understood precisely what I was trying to get at.
A good, sympathetic review is always a wonderful surprise.
For someone who's had the level of success I've had, there's been very little critical review of my work, which is pretty fascinating.
To my undying shame, I do read reviews. I don't read them all, but I like to get some kind of idea how things are going.
Praise and criticism seem to me to operate exactly on the same level. If you get a great review, it's really thrilling for about ten minutes. If you get a bad review, it's really crushing for ten minutes. Either way, you go on.
I will say that over the years I've been associated with things that were well-reviewed that I wasn't particularly crazy about, and I've been in things that didn't get very good reviews that I was rather fond of.
To me, I read good reviews in lots of papers and bad reviews in lots of papers.
I've always liked an easygoing, colloquial style. I like the kind of reviewer who is essentially a fellow reader, an enthusiast, a fan.
I don't read reviews, and I try not to read articles about me. It taints your outlook: if you believe the good things, you've got to believe the bad things, too.
No opposing quotes found.