I’ve been noticing a trend lately in the books I reviewed—or at least, the books I haven’t reviewed at all even though I’ve been meaning to. I’ve noticed that those books are the ones that I loving so frickin’ much that they make my heart want to burst into confetti and dancing unicorns. (Obviously, not very healthy.)
After I read Jen @ Pop Goes the Reader’s top ten list of books she adored but never wrote a review, it made me think of the books on my own list and why I haven’t written a review for any of them. The books on my list that I could remember off the top of my head are:
I love these books so fucking much. How do I put my love for them into words that can accurately convey the awesome? HOW?!
I want to be able to show my love and appreciation for them! I want to shout from the rooftops, where people can gaze up at me and point at the crazy person, about why I love these books! However, sometimes, it’s hard though because all I want to do are three things:
- Thrust the book into people’s faces.
- Demand they drop everything with, “You have to read this book. Right now. Trust me.”
- Give them a wink that’s really an awkward face twitch.
I don’t want to do that! (Not all the time.) I want to be articulate and convincing. I want readers to read my love letter and go, “YES. I WILL READ THIS BECAUSE CEE SAYS SO!” I don’t love books easily these days, so it means a lot to me when friends and people I know are persuaded into reading my favorites. It’s an absolutely thrilling feeling!
I find that books that I don’t truly love are easier for me to review. I just want to write the review quickly and move on. With books I love, I tend to procrastinate. Why?
- I want to continue to revel in the awesomeness and the ~feels.
- I want to do the book a justice! Whatever words I use in the review need to perfectly convey every bit of awesome I love, and it takes a while for me to craft that. (This is my perfectionism at play here.)
- Words are inadequate when all I want to do is flail my arms and squeal in excitement.
- When I look at the book, my brain and my insides get me all gooey, leaving me with a dazed grin on my face and making me sigh.
Even though I haven’t written reviews for my recent loves, I will do it. With Eyebrow King Lee Pace on my side, I will get it done!
* Thank you to Charlotte for the clever discussion title. ;)
Books that I love I totally struggle with, I sometimes feel like I am just rambling on and on without getting over the fact that the book is amazing. Books that I don’t like are easier, like you I just get on with and it it’s over and done with quickly. Thankfully I haven’t had too many bad reviews to write.
Great post!
Heather @ Random Redheaded Ramblings
I have that sometimes too! And Simon VS is my favorite book of the year so far!! :D
I totally understand what you mean! I’ve never just not written a review for a book, but I have had to wait days and days to figure out what I was actually going to say! Great post!
Tracy @ Cornerfolds
I have this all the time! It takes me a good long while to get around to reviewing books as it is but with books that I absolutely adore I just procrastinate even more. One of my reasons is that all I want to do is flail my arms but I can’t exactly so that when I’m trying to be articulate, can I? ;) I’m also worried that (as happens quite a lot) when I review a book, I realise that it wasn’t as great as I had thought it was when I finished reading it – which is extremely sad and heart breaking 0/10 do not recommend.
It’s definitely harder for me to write about books I loved than ones I don’t. I’ll Give You the Sun and Everything Leads to You are 2 reviews I wrote that I KNOW do not do the books justice. Beautifully written books are extremely hard for me cause I’m like: “The WRITING!!!” …and that’s all I can come up with because I could never convey how freaking beautiful Jandy Nelson writes. I guess I try to use quote examples, but with I’ll Give You the Sun you could literally use any sentence!
I’ve had a few books that I have loved and either haven’t reviewed at all or it took me forever to actually review. Remember Me Like This by Bret Anthony Johnson was one that I really had a hard time reviewing. It was such a phenomenal book and the writing was so amazing that I found it hard to put into words just how awesome this book really is. I wanted to the review to match up to the writing which was SO HARD. I still have a few other books that are just staring at me, waiting for me to share them with the world, but I’m still not ready yet. It’s almost like I want to keep them to myself for just a little bit longer before I have to share them and listen to other peoples’ opinions about them.
I don’t have a problem at all when it comes to reviewing books I hate – those are actually the easiest! Once I get going, I tend to ramble on and on about the issues I had with the story/characters/etc. The books I love though…yeah, those are the worst. I constantly feel as though I’ll never do the book justice, how can I express just how much I LOVED this amazing story?? There’s always that fear that I need to say exactly the right thing or someone might not even bother with the book.
UGHHHH this. If I don’t need to review the book, I ain’t gonna write one because it’s just too hard. I know I’ve written reviews for 3 of the same books you’ve put up there but I still don’t think I did justice to them. How could I???? (Also I feel so happy I’ve read all of the books you put up hehe although you did push me to read half of them lol)
But it’s not always the case like if I love a book so much but it also had so many aspects I wanted to talk about then it all comes flowing out. That was the case recently for The Revenge Playbook. Obviously for books I hate it’s easier to write reviews about too since I have so much to talk/complain about.
I always have the best ideas ;) *flips hair*
YES TO THIS. I struggle with this all the time. I have a difficult time articulating why I love certain books because the feels are just so intense that there really aren’t any words that do my feelings justice. I of course try, but my reviews often look something like three paragraphs of me going “OMG YOU GUYSSSSS READ ThiS.” I actually don’t think there’s any books I haven’t reviewed for this reason, but I can definitely see why that happens for you.
I actually did end up reviewing Everything Leads to You and Vicious, both of which I LOVED, and it ended up being a horrible mess of incoherent words xD Not reviewing is probably the better option! Some I just really can’t put coherent thoughts together, and that also applies to books I disliked intensely! Like Hello, I Love You? Took me like an hour to write that review. It was like pulling teeth!
One thing I’ve done for OMG I CAN’T books (like The Wrath and the Dawn) is put a crap ton of gifs at the beginning, then a smattering of bullet points about WHY I’m flailing so much. It kind of works I guess :P
ALL THE YESES!!
I’ve read Vicious three times by now and told myself to write a review afterwards every time BUT IT’S SO DAMN HARD!
I have a super long list of book I want to review but it’s just not working.
I understand where you are coming from. If I really love a book I almost feel like my thoughts on it could tarnish my memory. Or it’s a secret I want to share with myself and no one else.
I definitely have trouble writing reviews for books that I love. I always feel like I’m going to be so repetitive in them so I just end up putting off writing the review for a long time. There’s only so many ways that you can say “YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK”. I tend to find it easier to write reviews for books I didn’t much like. I end up having a lot more to say. Great discussion!
Krystianna @ Downright Dystopian
I don’t usually have a problem with writing reviews for books I hated. I tend to want to write more when I’m angry/raging against a book. I agree, though, that being completely in love for a book is much harder to articulate. I just sit in front of my post editor and want to write I LOVED ALL THE THINGS!!! REEEAAADDD IT YOU FOOOLLS :DDDD …It just feels repetitive sometimes when I do try to write a decent review for the book because I’m just saying over and over again that I loved everything. Usually I turn to gifs when I can’t properly convey my excitement/emotion. That always helps :)
I have this problem too for so many amazing books! It should be good enough to just say ‘This book was amazing and you should all read it now!’
It takes me ages to think up what it was that made me actually like the book. Whereas for books I’ve not particularly fond of it is always easier to point out all the flaws.
Great post!
Ah! I feel this way a lot too! It’s so, so hard sometimes to put my feelings into words, no lie. Like you, I want to do the books I’ve loved justice. I want to convince people to pick them up, read them and then join me in singing their praises! But the thought of that is so intimidating, so sometimes I do just resort to shoving books into people’s faces and telling them to read it ;)