New Review Format and Rating System

I've been contemplating renovating the blog for a long time. From top to bottom. In the past year I've learned a lot about reviewing and Book Love Affair has evolved. I have no doubt that through tiny, constant changes the blog has only improved through that time. I want to thank you all for sticking with me and for your input. There are a few more changes yet to come--and hopefully, these will be some of the last changes for awhile.

As a note, I'll be going back entry by entry and bringing all the older entries in line with this new system. Because, you know, I'm not compulsive.


A New Rating System
The new rating system will be a scale of 1 to 10. (I've tried both 1 to 5 and word-only rating systems before only to have them fail. I hope this will survive longer.) Each number will have a brief, direct 'meaning' included with the number in each post. More detailed information about each rating can be found in this post, which I'll add to the menu bar.

10 of 10: Perfection These are must reads and books I keep close to my heart. 9 of 10: Excellent Definitely indicates an author that should be followed and a highly recommended read. 8 of 10: Great An 8 or higher is a highly recommended read. 7 of 10: Above Average A recommended book. 6 of 10: Slightly Above Average I recommend the book, but only with qualifications. 5 of 10: Utterly Average A book that can be skipped without missing too much. 4 of 10: Slightly Below Average Not something I'd recommend. 3 of 10: Bad Not only a book that I wouldn't recommend, but that I'd advise steering the opposite direction from. 2 of 10: Horrible I highly recommend not wasting time on the book. 1 of 10: Irredeemable I can think of absolutely no reason why anyone should want to pick up such a novel.

Note: The review system was partially inspired by two of my favorite bloggers: Calico Reaction and The Book Smugglers.


A New Review Format
I felt that the previous review format was a little rambling and created very unwelcoming text blocks. Thus, the new review format is simple. The introductory part of the post will still be the same, with an image of the cover followed by the following information:

Title: Editor: Format: Available Formats: Page Count: Genre: Publisher: Pub. Date: ISBN-13: Series:

Following will be all the information included in the old review style, except under much easier to digest headings (These should all be self-explanatory):

Summary: A short blurb about the contents of the book from my perspective. (After all, don't you sometimes read the summaries on an author site or online book purchasing site and wonder if they read the same book sometimes?) TL;DR Version: A two to three sentence summary of the review. Review: Just like before, here will be where I speak about what I liked and did not like about the book, breaking it down into plot, characters, etc. Cover/Title/First Line Critique: This section should cover the 'approachability' of the book. A book should beckon to a reader. The cover, title, and first line are all tools an author should be using. This section will also discuss why I decided to read the book. Rating: The rating I chose to give the book as well as a short justification for that rating. At the end, in gray will be information regarding where/how the book was obtained from as following the standard set by the FTC.