I was talking briefly recently with a couple of authors about this story that is fact but sounded much more like a fiction book (or screenplay) written to produce over-dramatized terror for writers: underground legions of vicious, rabid “critics” on Goodreads that scoured the site blog feeds for any author who mentioned unseemly or complained about a reviewer.

That’s all it took; not derogatory name-calling or whiny complaints about how much better the author’s book was than the mean old reviewer made it sound. In fact, these minions, it seems, don’t care about the books or even the history (or quality) of the authors themselves, nor that any of the (usually taken-out-of-context negative author blurb) be directed at any one specific reviewer at all. The only qualifier seemed to be that an author would dare disparage a CRITIC.

Aside from getting me thinking about mental patients (which made me feel bad because mental patients have real problems they never wished for or wear like badges of honor), it really got me thinking about people who actually call themselves “critics”. Book critics, art critics, movie critics, etc.

[Now it’s here I’d like to make a distinction. I’m not talking any longer about “reviewers”—real ones, anyway; you know, people who’ve read a book cover-to-cover and then written a fair-handed review from their perspective on the various elements and overall quality of said book—I’m referring to individuals who really prefer to be called “critics” (or are from the aforementioned category of “reviewers” who really care less about the state of the art over which they’ve claimed some sort of expertise but rather disparaging anything they can find about the artist, his or her non-contextual comments, or really anything negative to write about).]

But where I thought I was going with this is, how often do you find a movie critic (as one example) who, for the first part of his career, made wonderful, magical movies? Or an art critic who for her first twenty or thirty years produced the most fantastic paintings or sculptures or murals? How about a book critic that actually published a book, much less one worth reading? (I’m guessing like everything else in life, there are some examples of the above, but let’s face it, those who can make generally spend their careers making.)

So I am admitting I allowed myself to believe that critics don’t produce anything. They criticize. And God save you if you come out and say it, as I just did. They’ll find you. They’ll ruin you. And what the fuck was up with these people anyway? Can you imagine if you had to like James Cameron to go see one of his movies and give it a favorable review to the public? (By the way, I have no idea what kind of person James is; he was just the first filmmaker that popped into my head.)

Then I realized I was mixing types of people and not giving critics (honest ones) their rightful respect and that I was confusing them (or at least throwing them in with) these knuckleheads who spend time creating places for authors they hate (not whose work they hate; just the authors because they said something they didn’t like.)

I want to apologize to legitimate critics out there (even though most of this back-and-forth epiphany went on inside my head and I never actually said anything mean to a critic). The thing is, I know there are a great many honest, professional, reputable critics of restaurants, films, books, paintings, and many other subjects. I also understand that being unable to produce something glorious does not in any way disqualify a person from recognizing that something for being glorious.

I realized there is also a real need for people with the ability to judge or comment on a work of art and that these professional “critics” can be pretty phenomenal. Their esteem is not built piece by piece, or project by project, using works or words or abilities of observation—these individuals might not be capable of putting a string of words together to save their lives but they could read yours and tell you exactly where and what was needed to really make it sing. A true gift.

That all being said, and coming full circle, I don’t understand these other characters. They quote others completely out of context and they make implications that couldn’t be further from the truth but in doing so, beneath the radar of most people watching, they begin to build a pyre of honest, talented, good-spirited, marvelous artists beneath themselves and I think eventually—when the pyre in tall enough that they feel they’ve risen above all they can see—they’ll light ablaze the hundreds of true artists in the solid belief that in doing so they created something grandiose.

Just to show you how crazy these wingnuts are, here are a few of the “shelves” for you authors out there (on a site dedicated to READING):

attacks-reviewers

author-cant-read

because-of-author

holy-lord-it-boggles-the-mind

These are places they put writer’s BOOKS.

You know what? It really does boggle the mind. To the honest critics out there, I’m sorry I lumped you in (if only in my mind) with these douchebags. And to you Goodreads dregs that seem to hold so much sway, you’re kidding yourselves. You’ve only sullied a respectable profession in this world because yet again you could not make it your own. For you: