By Anne Marble: Molly X. Chang is one of those authors whose upcoming book (To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods) was first attacked (review-bombed) by Cait Corrain. Now, she is being attacked by some reviewers. And they claimed her fans were attacking them over their negative reviews of her ARC.
Reportedly, it started when Chang had issues with some early one-star reviews (because she figured out that one of the reviewers was related to another author with an upcoming debut). She was worried about being review-bombed yet again. So some reviewers claimed they were being attacked by Chang’s followers. Some wonder if that was true, as shown in this tweet:
Chang was accused of “doxing” a reviewer. But from what I can tell, all Chang did was link the identity of a Goodreads reviewer to her Instagram account. That is not doxing. Chang did not post her address, phone number, etc. But now, that reviewer is allegedly telling people to post one-star reviews of the Chang book. What?!
Some of these reviewers accused Chang of writing a “colonizer” romance inspired by her grandfather’s horrible experiences in China (during the Second Sino-Japanese War). These “reviewers” are giving everyone the impression that the bad guys are based on the Japanese — and that the book is about the notorious Unit 731. But others have pointed out that the book is a fantasy novel — and the bad guys are based on the Roman Empire.
The reviewers might have great points. Maybe the book isn’t great. Maybe it is not nuanced in the way it deals with trauma.
But those points got lost in this mess. Especially once people started sending racist and violent posts to Chang. Also, people have had to point out that … Writers are allowed to write about dark things that are inspired by their ancestors’ pasts. Just because they do that doesn’t mean they are “normalizing” those things or “fetishizing” them or whatever the claim is this time.
Chang was forced to comment on these accusations — and provide spoilers for her book to settle some of the controversies. She had to spoil that the book is not an “enemies-to-lovers” romance. That the “love interest” in this book is not the actual love interest in the series, and that the heroine comes to realize how terrible he is.
Here are some of her tweets:
There is a Reddit discussion here: “Does anyone know what’s up with To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods on Goodreads?”
Some people have started taking notes on these so-called reviewers — not only questioning their claims but also questioning their motives.
Here is a screencap of one of Chang’s posts.
Also, here is a post from someone claiming the reviewers have been harassed:
Andrea Stewart commented on X:
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I’ve seen more people ask for Goodreads to be revamped or even shut down after this. Has anyone else seen similar calls?
Many have recommended Goodreads alternatives, but the ones I’ve explored don’t have as many features as Goodreads — no lists, no groups, etc. Can anyone recommend an alternative that has a lot of features?
Kudos to Andrea Stewart for one of the best descriptions of Goodreads.
These reviewers sound like tumblr puryteens, but I am always wary at an author complaining about bad reviews and highlighting them. People have a right not to like your book. I have given 1 star reviews to books by problematic people. It is my right, goodreads is there for people to express an opinion.
@mina
Yes, these reviewers definitely sound like puryteens. I’ve seen similar discussions about a recently published romance with a big age gap. Some people don’t know that you can just look at a novel and say, “Eww, I’m not into that.” Instead, they want to ban stuff and shame readers. Ick.
I think this blew up because a colleague (who meant well) sent questionable reviews to the author. Then, the author took some kind of action probably because she thought she was being review-bombed instead). Then, it snowballed.
But now, this has gone beyond reviews. According to the author, people are posting about this in non-book places, like “Han supremacy” and “Asian incel forums” — obviously trying to get her targeted by these lovely folks.
My first question is whether the book is out yet. If not, anyone who was not explicitly sent an ARC should have their review deleted, because it’s obviously an attack.
If it is out… this isn’t new. For “professional” reviews, as an example, I have yet to have an editor explain to me why they would have a reviewer cover a book or movie that they say, up front, that they don’t like this kind of story.
But the ones issuing outright threats… sorry, the writer shouldn’t save screen caps of someone making threats? Were it me, I’d suggest that the writer notify the FBI, since they are threats over wire. Or hate speech.
On the other hand, a bad review where the reviewer gives evidence of actually having read at least part of the book, shrug. Not all books are for everyone, though the reviewer giving a bad review should say something like “if you don’t like x, this book’s not for you”.
I’m not sure if people are prepared to read deeply enough to understand the situation fully.
The author who left the initial reviews on which all the hate is based admitted she had made up several accounts and deliberately left bad reviews. The people claiming to have been doxed were all the one person who has admitted it. It’s not a group of review bombs. A single author made multiple accounts and gave bad reviews to other authors while all of her accounts gave her own book 5 stars. When initially caught, she then created a fake screen capture of a “conversation with a friend” who she pretended was apologizing for being responsible. When people pointed out the screen cap had inconsistent timing, she acknowledged that she had invented that as well and the whole thing was her acting alone.
There’s no grey area on this. Cait Corrain attacked other authors
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cait_Corrain_review_bombing_controversy
This is not about Cait Correin, but a completely different case.
@mark
The book comes out in mid-April. (The reviews on Goodreads are early reviews.) Some people requested ARCs because they really wanted the book — and then they were disappointed when it didn’t meet their expectations. But some people later requested ARCs because they wanted to pile on.
I’m sure the author has screencaps. Even some of the public posts were abusive enough.
It Started with Cait in November and the debris spread all over the place and people are continuing to build on it. hence my words “initial reviews on which all the hate is based “
AnnM: shakes head. ARCs are for reviewers, who hopefully will write a review and post it publicly. They’re not for someone who just wants the book early… and to not pay.
Certainly, the only folks I sent eARCs to, or had them sent, were people I knew who did reviews.
@mark
I think most of the people who initially got ARCs are reviewers. They might not be “professional” reviewers (such as Publishers Weekly), but reviewers on Goodreads, Amazon, Instagram, BookTok, blogs, etc.
However, there might be a few bad actors who attached themselves to the mess later on. (I can’t find the screenshot — there are too many posts now.)
For huge debuts, publishers often send out more ARCs than usual — even to readers. A few years ago, St. Martin’s Press promoted a couple of upcoming domestic thrillers by sending thousands of ARCs to fans who responded to a Facebook ad. It worked because people talked about the book before it came out.
@Anna LibraryThing (which I use) has both lists and groups.
@Steve Mollmann
Thank you for reminding me of Library Thing! I don’t know why I haven’t visited for a while — although I did have trouble logging in at first.
It’s been a while. The last book I added was “Ritualistic Human Sacrifice.” (I swear, iIt’s a novel, not an instruction manual. 🙂 )
Am I the only one having a strong deja vu of RH and that brand of weaponisation of identity politics?
I sent the link to Publishers Weekly, although the news guy is currently in London at the London Book Fair.
Anna Feruglio Dal Dan: No. No you are not.
Kent Pollard: Cait Corrain was a particularly bonkers example but she was not the start of this sort of action. It’s been going on for years. And years.
Lenora, I’m not commenting on the historical trouble between authors and reviews, I’m commenting on this post.
I think Cait Corrain was sort of indirectly responsible for this latest mess. She was caught review-bombing Chang’s book months ago — and eventually sort of fessed up. In a later interview (for The Daily Beast), Corrain said she wasn’t racist and tried to blame autism and mental illness. So some of her victims were on guard after that because they realized she was trying to do an “apology tour.”
So when Chang started getting negative reviews again, someone alerted her to it. And she may have thrown the baby out with the bathwater.
Years before Corrain, there was the case of an Asian author who was accused of having racist elements in her hotly anticipated upcoming YA debut. This probably impacted her sales. Long after that was forgotten by most, “whispers” emerged claiming that a white author instigated the whole attack so that her book would do better. I can imagine Corrain learning about that case and saying, “Hold my beer.”
Many are calling for Goodreads to fix itself — or just calling for its end. Others are calling for publishers to do more to educate their debut authors on how to handle bad reviews, bad publicity, social media, etc. But I don’t think these lessons would stop somebody like Corrain.
I can’t understand the madness of thinking that reviewbombing another author’s book is going to help your own book succeed. You could hurt the Goodreads ratings of a hundred books and there’d still be thousands more a reader might choose over yours.