What Readers Look For in a Book (and Never Forgive)
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What Readers Look For in a Book (and Never Forgive)
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This episode is about what readers look for in a book and what book reviews show they never forgive. Dave argues that readers forgive almost anything if the story moves. Patty argues that one-star reviews list exactly what readers won't let go, and that those reviews stay public. Neither of them gives up their side.
You'll learn to sort story complaints from trust complaints. Story complaints are things like "too slow" or "didn't care about the characters." Trust complaints are typos, broken formatting, a blurb the book doesn't match, a character whose name changes halfway, or a broken genre promise. The hosts also cover why momentum in your opening and free sample matters more than polishing chapter thirty, and how Kindle Unlimited counts pages read (KENP). They explain why you can't reward, nudge or fake your way past a bad review: KDP's review rules and the FTC rule on fake reviews, in force since 21 October 2024. They also cover what KDP, Kobo and Apple currently say about AI disclosure.
In What Would You Do?, the hosts handle three cases: a first book with a "nothing happens until chapter five" review, a thriller backlist where book one keeps getting the same complaints, and an AI-drafted series called "machine-written." In Hot Takes, they argue that your free sample is the real cover, your blurb is a contract, and three-star reviews tell you more than your ones and fives. This week's task: read the one- and three-star reviews in your genre, find the complaint that keeps coming back, and check your first chapter and blurb against it.
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Topics: what readers look for in a book, book reviews, one-star reviews, how to handle bad book reviews, how to write a book blurb, genre expectations in fiction, KDP AI disclosure, self-publishing on Amazon
Voices are AI-generated (ElevenLabs) versions of the hosts, Dave and Patty of Publish at Scale. Scripts are written with AI and checked against a dated fact sheet. Not affiliated with Amazon, Kindle Direct Publishing or Anthropic. No income claims: results depend on your books and your work.