Ratings and Reviews

Dear Reader,

You may have heard authors mentioning that reviews are more important than ever, and if you’re reading this, you’re about to hear me repeat that because, well, folks, it’s getting harder and harder out there for authors like me.

To be honest, my books have never had massive ratings and review numbers. Maybe that’s because my books are “meh” to people, because they say you usually review the things you love or hate. I guess it’s good that I don’t have too much of that hate out there, but despite never having as many ratings and reviews as a lot of other authors out there, I’ve always had at least a decent number.

I should share that I’ve run my own ARC team (my wife has been handling most of that work) since nearly the beginning. At first, it was a handful of readers who got an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review, but then, we grew the team and ran it, along with everything else, for several years. I am grateful to people who have been on my ARC team for their support over the years, but at the end of 2025, I had to stop sending the ARCs because, with everything else going on in our lives (my wife and I) and because a lot of the ARC process was manual, it got to be too much to handle.

The world is on fire. My wife’s family is still in Ukraine, dealing with the war the world has forgotten about because of all of the other things happening. For most of us, book sales or even pages read on KU are not what they used to be. Books I thought would be big hits weren’t. Trying to market or promote books right now seems in poor taste, given the state of affairs. I’m constantly battling the worry that posting about my books when something else terrible just happened is a bad idea, but this is the only source of income for my family since I went full-time a couple of years ago (great timing on my part, huh?), so I still have to make sure that people know I publish books.

Why am I giving you all this background in a blog about reviews?

Because reviews have also tanked right around the time when the publishing platforms (and retailers) have decided that they matter more than ever. Reviews are also taking a lot longer to post, even when a reader actually tries to post them on a book’s release day, which means that other readers might not be able to find the book as easily or know if the book is right for them based on a reader’s review.

Amazon is very careful never to reveal their algorithmic secrets, so I’m telling you what I’ve experienced myself. I don’t have any data from them saying that, “Yes, Nicole, if no one reviews your book, we’ll shove it in the dungeon.” All I know is what I’ve witnessed and heard from other authors.

For example, my most recent release, Love Study, had NO ratings on Amazon from 2/27 (the release day) until 3/2. That’s 4 days post-release! As of this typing, 3/3 at about 8 in the morning my time, it still doesn’t have any reviews at all. Now, this isn’t necessarily because no one’s rated or reviewed. As I said, I know that people have reviewed on release days in the past, and Amazon just didn’t post it immediately. The reason I’m even bringing it up is that, despite – I’ll call them “normal” sales numbers (for 2025-2026, anyway) – the book hardly cracked the Top 100 in its categories until 3/3, which hasn’t happened for me since 2017, when I first started publishing, so it’s incredibly odd. It wasn’t until the ratings had appeared (either Amazon had finally released what’s been submitted by the readers or the readers finished reading and started rating) that it cracked the Top 100.

Unfortunately, as a lot of authors will tell you, that first week post-release is crucial. It’s when so many people are likely to find, buy, or read your book, and hopefully, rate and review it. If that doesn’t happen, a downstream cascade of events follows, because when a book is not rated/reviewed, it’s not getting ranked. And when a book is not ranked or ranked poorly, it’s not getting visibility, so there go sales and page reads. No sales/pages, no income. No income for an author means fewer or no books in the future because we are forced to do other things than write and publish.

I understand that world and economic conditions are pretty terrible out there right now. People are busier than they’ve ever been before, so even having time to read a book is hard to come by, and if someone actually does find the time to enjoy a sapphic romance like mine, they might not have a spare minute after to leave that rating or review, but this is me, quite frankly, begging readers to spare that minute for me.

I’ve asked in newsletters and social posts previously, and I haven’t seen much traction, so I broke down and wrote a blog, hoping to give a little more background on why reviews especially, but even just a rating, are so important.

This extends to audiobooks as well, by the way. When I announced that I’d re-acquired my rights from Tantor for 4 of my audiobooks, I was met with so much support in the comments on social, for which I was incredibly grateful, but when I asked for reviews to help support those re-releases because the old versions, along with their original reviews, were gone, I haven’t received many of those. In general, my audiobooks tend to be rated/reviewed less than some other authors as well. I say that just to highlight that producing these books (or re-producing them in some cases) is an expensive endeavor because I believe in working with the best narrators and will never use AI, and reviews will help encourage others to pick up the audio versions, which allows me to produce more books in the future.

On that note, many authors work day jobs to support their writing career. I was one of them until two years ago, and to be vulnerable here, I’ll say that the job I left, while by choice, was a toxic situation for me that I had to get out of at that time for my health and sanity, so I left, and as I’ve said in another blog, I still job-search, but to no avail so far, which makes sense because the job market absolutely sucks, and that’s not likely to change maybe ever now. The reality is that my wife is my editor, cover designer, and handles most of the business stuff while I focus on the writing, revisions, social media, and other things, but I, like everyone else in my situation, need reader support in order to be able to continue to do this, and if we’re not successful, then, my wife and I will likely have to slow down or stop publishing altogether so that we can both focus on other things, like whatever kinds of jobs we can still get now that the robots are taking over.

This is the reality of so many other authors, so know that when I’m begging for you to rate/review my books after you’ve read them, that also extends to other authors. When you see us post something, asking for a rating or review, that’s likely us sucking up our pride and saying, “We need your help.” (If you’ve seen the original Space Jam movie, I’m saying that in the Bugs Bunny way).

If you have reviewed my books in the past, thank you so much! Know that it helps and that I deeply appreciate it. You should also know that I understand how insane and busy this world seems to have gotten (I’m a Millennial, so I definitely get it), and I understand how valuable your time is. Time is the one thing we can never get back, so if you take that extra moment to tell another reader – and subsequently, the rankings algorithm – that you liked my book, it means the world to me.

If you’ve liked one of my releases this year (Origins of Eternity or Love Study) and you haven’t yet rated or reviewed, those books could still use a little love. I’ll have news on my next release soon, and it’ll also need that same love, so thank you in advance if you decide to read and review that one as well.

I’ll close with this: the book landscape is changing rapidly. You might see me trying some new things to see what sticks, so to speak. Sales help me know, but ratings, reviews, and you recommending the book to others in Facebook groups, on Instagram, BlueSky, Threads, or somewhere else help me understand more of what people might want to read or like to see from me. I’ll always write whatever I want to write, that will never change, but a lot of what my wife and I do to plan for a year is go over the books I’ve written and try to decide what to pair with what.

For example, Origins of Eternity is a vampire book, so it’s in a sub-genre with a smaller audience. We have to pair that with something like Love Study, which is a contemporary romance, in order to make sure we can carry ourselves to the next release. It’s why a book like Origins needs to do well because if a book like that (or another of my sub-genre books like SoulMatch or Echoes) doesn’t do well, I have to make sure we prep for that when we plan our releases and why I can’t release several of those books in a row or potentially at all in the future.

You’ll likely see authors like me throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks. I know some authors have joined Patreon. Others have started selling merch. I’ve tried to offer author services for others who might want to learn from me. We’re all trying to figure it out. However you are able to support us, know that it’s appreciated, but a rating or review is free and really does go a long way to keep authors afloat.

If you’ve gotten all the way down here, thank you! I know how valuable your time is.

Nicole