I get a lot of questions about why I submitted to a particular review and which ones are real and which ones are scams and which ones are legit and oh do they only have it for children's books or do they only have it for black people do they only have it for younger people and I just thought I would make a blog post to help address some of that. First question I always get is why in the world should they have their book reviewed because they had a friend, a teacher, an aunt, an auntie, somebody's kid read it and they said it was good.
Well that's nice that those people appreciate what you are putting out. The reason you have a professional review is because it's supposed to give you an un-bodied book. The highest take on your literature. There are several highly qualified people behind those review companies that are putting their best foot forward to evaluate your book based off of cover, the plot, making sure the theme match is making sure the content, the grammar, that it is age appropriate, developmentally and culturally sensitive as well. And there's a number of things that reviews evaluate.
I've had my book reviewed by a number of groups and I will tell you that I've had three Kirkus reviews and we're going to talk about what Kirkus is one of the big boys that people are looking at. They're like, ooh, you got a Kirkus review. Like people get excited about that and while it is a higher priced review, it does. Have some benefits. What I have seen as beneficial for that particular review in Kirkus. What I have found particularly helpful for that is that organizations like public libraries, schools, and universities, they value the opinion of Kirkus. So, when you are willing to spend the money or invest in your book in a professional review from Kirkus, it means a lot. A lot of times it does feel like a, don't get upset me when I say this, but it feels like a summary.
Yes, it feels like a summary of your book. And then there are maybe two lines that you can actually use in what I find is most valuable to market your book. But it does open your world up to another group of individuals who have the ability to purchase your book and put them on the library. There's a number of others as well and I am going to actually shift my screen so I can show you those, but I will say do not be afraid of reviews.
Don't be afraid to get your book professionally reviewed because it could reveal some things about your book that you need to change, or you need to enhance. To maximize your opportunities to promote your book to market to connect with others and more importantly to find that target reader because if you only wrote the book get close if you only wrote the book for yourself there was no purpose in publishing it. I know I shouldn't say that, but the truth is, if you are writing books only for yourself, this is not the market for them. You are literally publishing a book to benefit the next person. So, the reviews help you understand what someone who is not connected to you thinks, says, feels and understands about your book. But those reviews hold weight because of the organizations that they're connected to.
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