What does my personal rating means?

The idea came to me after reading Haley’s post “Crap Critiquing Skills“; However, it’s also the conversation “The bloggers in the attic’s” by Camilla are conversing this month aswell! Though their discussion is more toward the rating in general, while this will be only what my stars means and a bit more about my reviews — but feel free to head onto Camilla’s link if you’d be interrested onto reading more about that topic!

Sophie @ Beware of the reader also did quite the interresting post earlier this month, regarding IF we shall give books 5stars, and if so, what our 5stars standards are.

 

**Note that the very “shortened” version of what my personal rating is can be found on my Review Guide & Policy page on the blog at any given time** 

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First, the stars?

As you could’ve had seen, i’m still using the rating on 5 stars. And yes, the different kind of books all follow the same process and thus, the same “format” — meaning my stars always means the same thing regardless of it it’s a contemporary romance VS a poetry book for exemple.

However! Because one book is “lower” in stars, it does not mean that I enjoyed it less; or going the opposite way, a five star do not mean that it was a steady enjoying ride or that some things in it wasn’t problematic. As my review posts gets updated with the more time i’ve been blogging, so do my stars; it relatively stays the same.. but some details may be added or moved depending on my way of thinking.

 

Okay.. but what do they means..?

The stars are not in any way related to how good or badly written the work was; because let’s face it.. I cannot identify what is considered “good” or “bad”, and specially if we are speaking anything in english.

 

What do I rate though?

– As i’m someone who absolutely adore re-reading my books, this enter into consideration. If the ride was really fun but I don’t feel like rereading it more than once.. the stars will lower.

– The feels!! Like everyone (or mostly), I love to be destroyed completely.. I need what I read to make me feel real emotions; crying, sparks of joy, laughing, like someone stabbed me in the heart, etc..

– Characters. Very important, I need to relate or get attached to a character so much that i’d consistently compare everything with that ONE from that point on. Think of Finch from «All our bright places» or Lucas from the sovereign series by Josie Jaffrey. There’s just something about thoses that have me SWOONING and never ever shut up about them.

I need them to be human and be deeply written. To have real emotions, real struggles and real problems. No character is “unlikeable” to me, I need them to be angry, have that sass going on.. SOMETHING that makes them stand out as «this could be a real person», not just something described on a page. Ideally, you want them to act their ages aswell; it’s absolutely normal for a 17years old to have cringey reactions and do stupid choices that us adult readers will think that makes no sense as we KNOW better. But the characters are not supposed to, that’s the thing. Let them be silly!! Let them take stupid decision and regret them!! Let them be teenagers!! Sure, I may not be able to “relate with a teen in my mid-twenies” but I guarantee you my inside teenager, the 17yo me I once was, can.

– Make my wheels spin. Something I just now discovered with fantasy books in particular.. Having me closing the book after an hour or two of reading and have my brain go on and on about what happened, what could happen, where the story could go, where id WANT it go, etc.. sometimes this can even lead it further and the spinning end up creating post ideas. Less good on my sleeping, however, as I do read right before heading to bed.

– Make the world dissapear around me. How swallowed am I in the book and it’s world, is it hard for me to stop reading? are the hours spent reading just dissapeared without a trace?

 

The stars that I give to the books I read depends on how much of thoses are followed and how good. Some items may be more important than the others, and thus the stars will be given accordingly upon if they are included or not.

 

Some other things..

I’m one to believe highly in trigger warnings. Though gore and violence and anything else, really is not something to bother me- there is that ONE thing that I cannot handle. There might be different reasons upon why someone would need one, so I try my best to include them when needed. If I miss any important ones, i’m truly sorry! This was not on purpose and as i’m not quite trained to see them yet, I may have missed them. If you know there’s some and I haven’t wrote it in my review, please feel free to let me know ! I’d highly appreciate.

I also want my review to be spoiler-free – being as vague as possible and not spoiling any big plot twist.

 

 

 

What does your rating means?
Do you have a constant one for all the different books/a list of things you’re looking for in a book?