The Whimsical World of Goodreads

In preparation for a new novel I have upcoming fairly soon -- (watch this space...) -- I've been wandering around social media websites and such.  I was browsing Goodreads today, and noticed something there.

On Amazon, my book -- A Christmas Carol 2:  The Return of Scrooge -- has a respectable rating of about 4.3 on a scale of 5.  However, on Goodreads, it's a paltry -- 2.0!  (I think you get 1.0 just for typing letters, even if in a random, indecipherable order.)  Is there such a discrepancy in readers??  No, in this case the mystery is easily resolved.  The difference is that on Goodreads only one person there has rated it.  And...well, let's just say that he hated it.  I mean, really hated it.  Thought it was among the worst books he's ever read.  Thought it was a travesty of Dickens.  I'm not exaggerating any of this.  In fact, I still can't figure out why I got as high as 2.0.  I suspect he gave me points because the words weren't random.  And one of the things he most-hated, it seems, is that I write for the movies and TV, and this apparently is an unpardonable sin and proof-positive why TV and movies are so terrible.  Perhaps he'd have hated the book anyway, who knows?  (I've been told by other writers, however, that the mere mention of being "from Hollywood" guarantees being trashed by some.)  Hey, it happens.  Not a problem.  I've gotten good and bad reviews, I understand the concept.

I did feel bad about seeing a 2.0 rating though.  So, I left a comment -- quite polite, I think.  It read, "I never begrudge anyone their opinion. I understand that Mr. Schmidt hated my book. Fair enough. I just hope others will be fair, as well, and check out other reviews on Amazon. For instance, David Perdue who runs 'The Dickens Page' wrote -- 'I downloaded it to my Kindle and finished reading it today... thoroughly enjoyed it! I tweeted it out this evening.' And Catherine Barker, president of the NSW Disckens Society wrote, 'A tongue in cheek sequel...What fun!'  I'm biased, of course -- but I only suggest that there are other opinions."

I thought that was reasonable.

Anyway, the larger point of all this is that if there are any readers of the Elisberg Industries website here who are also members of Goodreads -- and if you've read the book -- it would be appreciated if you could go to its page and rate it.  Fairly and honestly, for whatever you believe.  If you'd like to write short review comments, all the better.  But just rating it would be enough.  To make things easy for you, this is the direct link here.

I know I've mentioned previously the subject of User Reviews for the book on Amazon, but this is different.  After all, no reviews are necessary here to even be written -- it's just that a 2.0 rating from one person is more than a bit out of whack.

At the very least, I'm sure you appreciate that words not random in book the order are.

Thanks.