...Not reading reviews or having someone she trusted go over them first and only show her the ones that wouldn't upset her would also have been doing "what she had to do to stay functional." And, unlike stalking and then profiting off of said stalking, it wouldn't have harmed anyone.
Seeing some of the posts on Twitter ... grrr... when this screenshot was shared, it just set my teeth on edge. Blythe certainly felt harmed enough and frightened enough she stopped reviewing, as have others.
Although I suppose poor Blythe and all of us book reviewers and bloggers should be ashamed of how we "lie, cheat, manipulate and seek to do harm" by writing consumer opinions of commercial products. How dare we not all be jailed or stalked (or at least sued successfully to the benefit of commercial interests putting out the retail product)? How dare we use the Internet, the blogosphere and social media for anything other than promoting everyone's book babies as if we have a right to share space with the commercials! Who needs personal or consumer speech, drown all of it out by any means necessary so only commercial speech and endless promotions remain! Then damn anyone not using those boring 5-star advertisements to ensure funds make all authors wealthy no matter the quality of the work!
(I'm not exactly sure what she meant by "cheat" in the context of book reviewing.)
And the tool misuse bit--is she bashing HTML or template use of bloggers on sites like WordPress? Isn't that a negative judgment on their published blogs? By her standards, doesn't that make her a bully and a tormenter? By tools does she mean the Internet and website as if she is so in a higher class than her readers that we should be completely banned from using the Internet unless for her approved purposes?
What's wrong is that anyone dares tries to tell anyone of legal age what to read, how to read it or how/if to review it (outside of someone who hired you write a review for a professional publication or site -- and even then that someone is limited to the terms of your agreement and stated site policies).
What's wrong are the voices silenced by these dramas, those whose reading experience is no longer as enjoyable without that voice, the majority of perfectly nice authors having increasing difficulty getting a readership..
To her the bully is ALWAYS the reviewer -- and let's be clear, "bullying", in her eyes, includes simply negatively reviewing a book. She went off the rails over a negative review on Amazon way back some 10+ years ago and has gradually gotten worse.
6 years ago
Yep, I was still around when that happened. She's unreal.
Finding Anne Rice on social media was one of the biggest mistakes ever. They say don't meet your idols. You also shouldn't follow their social media postings either. I love Interview with a Vampire. It remains one of my favorite novels to this day but seeing some of her posts takes a little bit away every time. This is why you shouldn't get emotionally attached to inanimate objects.
Yup. I loved the eary "Vampire Chronicles" books, especially the first 3. I'd been over her by the time the Amazon snafu rolled around ... if I hadn't been, though, that incident woiuld have been a complete and profound shock. As it was, I just stopped buying and reading her books, which wasn't exactly a major sacrifice at the time.
If someone gifts me her books I will keep them but I will confess to not having read much outside of the early Vampire Chronicles and the original Mayfair Witches. After a while, she just started writing the same story over and over. Can I say that out loud? Will her "people of the page" find me here?
Although I suppose poor Blythe and all of us book reviewers and bloggers should be ashamed of how we "lie, cheat, manipulate and seek to do harm" by writing consumer opinions of commercial products. How dare we not all be jailed or stalked (or at least sued successfully to the benefit of commercial interests putting out the retail product)? How dare we use the Internet, the blogosphere and social media for anything other than promoting everyone's book babies as if we have a right to share space with the commercials! Who needs personal or consumer speech, drown all of it out by any means necessary so only commercial speech and endless promotions remain! Then damn anyone not using those boring 5-star advertisements to ensure funds make all authors wealthy no matter the quality of the work!
(I'm not exactly sure what she meant by "cheat" in the context of book reviewing.)
What's wrong is that anyone dares tries to tell anyone of legal age what to read, how to read it or how/if to review it (outside of someone who hired you write a review for a professional publication or site -- and even then that someone is limited to the terms of your agreement and stated site policies).
What's wrong are the voices silenced by these dramas, those whose reading experience is no longer as enjoyable without that voice, the majority of perfectly nice authors having increasing difficulty getting a readership..
And yes! Even the story she tells in "Cry to Heaven" (my favorite book by her, actually) has some of the same elements as her vampire stories.