Let's Talk | Rating Books

Most of us have Goodreads account, and after we have finished reading yet another amazing novel and mark it as 'read', we are faced with the stuggle that is rating the book. Everybody has their own way of rating books and today I'm going to share my ways with you.


Question Of The Day:
How do you like to rate books?

1 And 2 Stars
This one is really simple: I don't rate books one or two stars. It may sound a bit stupid, but I feel like it's not fair to rate a book one or two stars. The author worked really hard on the book and it feels so horrible to rate a book one or two stars. There will always be people who will love the book and I don't want them to not read the book because of bad one or two star ratings. 
And besides this, I've never really read a book I hated so much I felt the need to rate it so low.



3 Stars
I rate books three stars when I just didn't enjoy them much. Some examples of books I rated three stars are Red Queen, Allegiant, Passenger, I Was Here and The Fault In Our Stars. I did not like these books and kind regret that I ever even took the time to read them, but because I didn't absolutely HATE them, I still rate the books 3 stars.

 


4 Stars
This is what I rate most books I read. If I enjoy the book and the series but didn't think it was too special or anything or that it will stick with me for a long time, I'll choose 4 stars. Some books I rated 4 stars are The Raven Boys, The Hunger Games, Shatter Me and Me Before You. 


 

4.5 Stars
Although you cannot pick this as a rating on Goodreads, I choose this one quite often as well. When I read a book, I always compare them to my favorites and see if I love it as much as I loved those books. If the answer is no, not as much, but still really liked it, I go for the 4.5 stars. This is what I did with Harry Potter. I really enjoyed them, but not as much as I enjoyed my absolute favorite novels, so I rated them 4.5 stars. Maybe it's a bad thing to compare books to others, but I do it anyway. It helps me to rate them properly.


 


5 Stars
Obviously, this is what I rate my absolute all time favorite books. This means anything written by Sarah J Maas and Cassandra Clare. How do I know a book is a favorite? When I think about the book for months after I've read it, sit on my bed rereading my favorite pars, wait months after months with a longing feeling for the next book and cry and laugh with the characters. Sometimes it's so bad, that if I finish the new book or the full series, I can't even sleep at night because I am so incredibly sad it's finished. That's how I know a book is a favorite.

  

Do I care about book ratings?
I do, it's really bad, actually. When I see a book that has gotten a lot of bad ratings and bad reviews, I immediately thing that I won't like the book. This is mostly the reason why I don't rate books one or two stars myself. I know other people their ratings and what booktubers and bloggers say about it shouldn't cloud my judgement so much, but it does and I hate myself for it.
I can also get really mad when I really love a book and someone else writes a really bad review about it and kicking it into the dirt. I can get so mad when I see that and again, I know I shouldn't let other people their ratings and reviews get to me, but they do. I guess I'm just very passionate when it comes to my favorite books haha.

So how do you rate books and do you agree with my system or do you completely disagree and rate in a very different way? Let me know in the comments.

~ Amber