I have had very mixed feelings about this review. Initially I was obviously disappointed that someone else didn’t love my little monster as much as I, but then I got to thinking. It is totally unrealistic to think that everyone will be as adoring of Rumble. I suspect there is an expectation that every single child’s book should ‘fit’ the usual perceived format. This, I feel, drastically restricts not only the author, but the young reader, whose imagination has not yet become a distant memory and all writers/authors play in their imagination all the time anyway. How else would we have entire worlds populated with imaginary friends? I purposely chose a black and white world for Rumble to highlight how he perceived the ‘upper’ world with its brightness and colour.
So after pondering this review for some weeks I have decided not to take it to heart but see it as a single person’s perception and no more.
I will view it as part of my ‘growing’ process along my writing journey…do I need to garner a thick skin?
How do you response to negative reviews?
June 9, 2012
June 15, 2012 at 9:35 am
Part of the process of being a writer includes not only the inevitable ‘rejection’ but the sought after ‘review.’ A review means that someone takes the time to read our work and comment. We put our books out there for that reason – what we cannot control is what they will think of it after reading it and what words they will use to reflect their thoughts, feelings, and impressions of our work. Once we let our books go into the big world, like our children, we are no longer able to protect them from what may or may not happen, or what may or may not be said.
Your comment of “it is a single person’s perception” is all that is needed in response. Pick out the positive and comment to that, if you want to comment to anything at all.
Not everyone feels as this reviewer does – you have proof of that.
LikeLike