Curious if anyone’s following this tale. I follow Booktube so a video by Mina Reads popped up in my suggested and the story seems crazy. Apparently Lauren Hough’s first book, a memoir, came out last Tuesday and she was critical on Twitter of a couple reviewers on GoodReads who only gave her book 4.5 stars (out of 5), calling them “nerds on a power trip.” Things only got crazier from there, with Hough doubling down, quadrupling down, then octupling down with more outrageous, defensive tweets. Part o the blacklash is GoodReads reviewers now giving her book 1 star reviews to downvote it, acknowledging they haven’t read it and don’t plan to.
Apparently she’s written some popular essays and worked up to this book. She complimented a reviewer for giving her 5 stars, then started in on a couple of reviewers that gave her 4.5, despite both saying they loved the book.
To me, the most puzzling part is that her Twitter followers took up the cause and began harassing the evil reviewers, rather than pointing out to the author that yeah, 4.5 stars is actually pretty good.
Hough has since gone on to claim that people (some of them authors, like Hank Green) criticizing her for her (over)reaction are victim-blaming, among other things.
She’s actually compared these bad reviews to being raped. And she still uses “nerd” as an insult in 2021 - Karens gonna Karen, I guess.
And she really seems to have an overwhelming sense of her own importance (she literally said “I’ll be the book your hairdresser won’t shut up about” like that was a good thing. Hairdressers probably didn’t shut up about Eat,Pray,Love and The Secret, either)
Sure, but being a survivor of an abusive sex cult she gets a free pass on me amplifying her weird hangup on ratings on her book about it. I saw a tweet from a book-twitter about it, but decided not to retweet, and I’m certainly not going to give it a one star review on Goodreads. Childishness all around.
I agree the people giving it a 1-star review unread are childish. That’s not who she was originally being an asshole to.
Being an abuse survivor does not entitle her to 5-star reviews, and it doesn’t entitle her to be a shit to the 4-star reviewers.
It’s not like that part of her story is particularly unique. You didn’t see Rose McGowan throwing a precious snowflake diva shitfit on GR that Brave only rates a 3.84…
Typically, I’d agree. What makes it noteable is her being an asshole about something positive. We’re all used to people on the internet over-reacting to imagined slights (Lindsey Ellis being chased off Twitter for noting Raya is similar to Avatar, for example), but to actual praise? I was seriously expecting a sort of Emily Latella style moment where someone explained 4.5 was actually good and she said “Oh! …never mind.”
I believe that she started her rant with a screenshot of two people, one of which was essentially “This book is a 4.5, so I rounded up!” and the second being a reply saying “I had it as a 4.5 too, but I rounded down, still great!” and then pitched a fit.