Thoughts on Book Reviews and Using the Five Star Rating System

A few guiding thoughts on the whole 5-star rating system for book reviews.

And not to repeat what I said, here are five further considerations:

1. Did you keep it short and readable? You don't have to recap the whole story. They can read that on the back cover. Just tell us how you felt about it.

2. Is this the kind of book you normally read? If you don't, say so in the review. We tend to judge our favorite genres differently than we do those other genres we don't read as often.

3. What is your reason for giving the rating the number of stars you did? Was it a random choice? Do you have requirements for each star value?

4. Have you cross-posted the review in several places? Goodreads? Amazon? Barnes & Noble? On your blog? You should. It really does help.

5. Have you promoted your book review on social media? If you hang out on Facebook, Twitter, GooglePlus, or any other site, please do!

Leave a comment about the things you consider important in leaving or receiving book reviews.
Naomi

Mysteries With a Message - Author Judith Rolf

This week we have a special treat! Author Judith Rolfs has been published in every genre. As an author and professional marriage and family counselor, Judith focuses on motivating people to live their best lives - emotionally, physically and spiritually. In her thirties, she researched the complexity of the natural world and moved from agnosticism to faith in God - Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Today, she talks about her latest novel, Never Tomorrow.



Tell our readers about your new mystery novel Never Tomorrow.

Thanks for asking. It’s like having a new baby - I welcome a chance to talk about Never Tomorrow after literally years in the writing. This is a powerful murder mystery, plus more - a psychological thriller that probes the marriage relationship, infidelity and forgiveness. I use my insights and experiences as a psychotherapist for three decades to instill deep emotions in my characters– the grieving, the loves, and the deep joys, that we all experience in real life. These are integrated with a compelling murder mystery.

This is your seventeenth book but only your third mystery novel. Tell us about your switch to fiction from non-fiction.

My previous books were how-to books about marriage and parenting and family issues, also a devotional and a teen book. Mysteries are a huge change. They are much more difficult to write, but seem to have a greater impact on readers.

Which leads to my next question. I understand your slogan is Mysteries With A Message. Explain please.

My mysteries center on real life family issues while keeping the suspense steaming.  Directive 99, my first self- suspense novel is about conflict between a woman’s career vs. family priorities. She makes major life changes when her husband is kidnapped. My next mystery novel Bullet in the Night with Prism Books is about genuine rehabilitation leading to life change and the value of nurturing friendships. I want readers to have a takeaway to ponder that can help them face situations in their own lives with more wisdom and confidence.

Tell us about where you like to write and a bit about your process.

My favorite writing places are my cottage in the woods in Fontana-on-Geneva Lake and a winter beach condo we rent in Venice, FL. I need solitude to create the story and develop my characters, but then I love to edit in coffee shops where I’m immersed in the energy of people. Relationships have always been fascinating to me, which is why I became a psychotherapist. Of course it’s helpful as an author to develop well-rounded characters. I also love to travel. In fact, Never Tomorrow starts out in Ballybunion, Ireland which I researched during a three-week trip there.

How and when did your writing career begin?

My writing career began at age ten creating stories for neighborhood children. I wrote newspaper editorials in high school, and was part of the Superior Student program at Marquette University, which published me in their literary journal. I love everything about writing especially contact with readers and other authors who are so gracious!  I recently met Pat Gussin, New York Times Best Selling Author of After the Fall and she offered to read Never Tomorrow prior to publication. She blessed me with an amazing review: “Layer upon layer of intrigue—laced with murder–propels this novel to the pinnacle of suspense. An ingenious plot, dynamic and complex characters, and an insight into the troubled avenues of human behavior rarely exposed make NEVER TOMORROW a stand-out for readers of mysteries, thrillers, and suspense.”

In closing, where can we find your new book baby?

Never Tomorrow is available through Prism Book Group, on Amazon and Barnes & Noble and through local libraries. If it’s not at the local library I hope readers will request it. Thank you for featuring me on your blog. It’s been a pleasure.

-----------------------------------------------

Visit Judith at http://judithrolfs.com/Dr._Judith_Rolfs/Home.html

 

A compelling mystery with a powerful theme of forgiveness and healing...

Journalist Whitney Barnes investigates the mysterious death of her mother and three women from Cortland City seeking the thread that links them to an enigmatic killer. Why are women being murdered with no apparent motives for their death? Police are mystified at the lack of clues and a growing sense of fear surrounds the community. Who will be the next victim?

Determined to find the killer, Whitney discovers these women were dealing with wounds from their troubling pasts, but what was their connection? She teams up with Dr. Sarah Stevens, an expert on women's issues, to ferret out information while TV talk show host Rich and real estate broker Jordan vie for Whitney's affection.

Whitney discovers new strength within her, but is it powerful enough to cope with this dark force of evil?  Suspense escalates as Whitney becomes the killer's next target.

Writing Your Novel: How to Shake Up a Scene

I plot. Even though I am not a seat-of-the-pants writer, however, there are many times in writing a scene that the characters take off on their own. Most dialogue happens this way for me, and oftentimes, while I know what is supposed to happen in a scene -- which questions will be asked and answered, how relationships will change, what crisis will be formed or averted -- the actions themselves become organic. This can be a great thing, and sometimes it can be a little bit stifling. It all comes down to the shakeup.

Recently, I ran into some difficulty while working on a book that will come out in 2018. I found that, as is usual in my stories, I was using a lot of subtlety and nuance while painting the overall arc of the tale. That's good. I like subtlety and nuance. However -- sometimes subtlety and nuance, if that's all I use, become fancy terms for slow and boring. A book without them might be shallow, corny, predictable, or any number of other things that, for me, just aren't compelling enough to keep reading. But lack of definitive action is another thing. So how do I keep subtlety and nuance and still bate the reader's breath? The answer is to shake up the scene.

The primary way to shake up a scene is to ask the question, what can happen in this scene that the reader isn't expecting? For instance, I wrote a scene the other day in which I have a man and woman who live near each other walking home together. Per my plot outline, I knew they would have some conversation which would help them to get to know each other better while at the same time keeping each of their prospective secrets intact. They would start to feel like deeper friends and begin to struggle with guilt over keeping those individual secrets. Okay. Good. Got it. But stepping back, I realized it was a very nuanced type of scene. Little things like hints and secrets, while very cool and emotionally triggering, were happening. Still, I felt while writing this scene, that it was too "soft" a scene on top of a previous soft scene. I wasn't certain it offered enough to make the reader really care or compel them to read the next chapter.

Then out of the blue, an idea struck to shake that scene up. I asked, what is the reader not expecting? What am I not expecting? And voilà! Another fellow acquainted with both characters happened along, all full of vim and vigor, stirred the pot, and asked the woman out, right there in front of that other fellow. (You get this is a romance, right?) This little shake up lifted those nuances I had been writing to another level. On an aside -- I had known I wanted to use this third character in a way like that earlier, but I just hadn't seen it happening right there, until I asked that question about how I could shake up that scene.

So if you're stuck or feeling like a scene in your story just isn't clicking completely, ask yourself what it is that you and your reader aren't expecting. I think it goes without saying -- then again, maybe not -- that the shakeup should make sense to the story. I mean, keep it real. Believable. Organic. Not something so far-fetched that the reader will say, "Come on, I don't believe it," and toss the book.

Try it and see. Causing a little shake up in a scene now and then will revitalize your drive while you're penning your novel, and the end result will be to give the reader the emotional ride they're looking for.

Write on!