the ask@AAR: What’s the point of an honest book review?
I had a disheartening experience this week. There’s an author AAR has reviewed 13 times in the past six years. In that time, we’ve given her work three As, three A-s, three B+s, one B, one B-, and one C. Since 2017, she has only gotten As and B+s here. She has a new book coming out next month and I reached out to her publicist to see if we could get a review copy.
At first said publisher asked where we would post our reviews. When I told her we only promise postings on our site and explained who we are, she then wrote me this:
I’m familiar with you guys and I’ve given ARCs to you before, but I’ve never given one without knowing who the reviewer is. As I’m sure you can understand, I’m not likely to give someone a free book who has generally disliked her books in the past. Can you tell me who the reviewer […]
Yesterday, at age 96, 70 years of which she ruled as the Queen of England, Queen Elizabeth II died. She had an extraordinary life–The Telegraph once wrote that by her 90th birthday she had covered 
As she aged, her popularity rose and the weeks to come will be rife with stories about her remarkable life.