A Typical Day for a Romance Novel Reviewer
So you’re reading this and wondering if YOU could be a reviewer? You love romance novels and everything to do with them, you have a gazillion review sites bookmarked, and Amazon.com greets you by name every time you visit it online.
So… here’s what it’s really like… Take a look and THEN make the decision.
6:30am
Stumble out of bed and trip over the book that fell off the quilt last night when you fell asleep reading it.
6:45am
Make coffee. Yawn. Try to find spot on table for coffee around the fourteen packages of paperbacks and Advance Review Copy manuscripts that arrived yesterday.
7:00am
Shower. No need to shave or worry about the hair. This is an indoor job, and you will see nobody except possibly your cat/dog/goldfish if you remember to feed them.
7:30am
Settle down into your "reading" chair with the first book of the day, a second cup of coffee and a pop tart/bagel/bowl of cereal. Toast and peanut butter will be reserved for that carb-loading snack later on.
9:00am
Bathroom break. The first of many. You ignore the two books sitting beside you, since you’re still in the throes of the romance novel you just put down.
10:00am thru 12:00pm
More bathroom breaks. You ignore the “puppy eye” thing your pet is giving you in a vain attempt to attract attention. You also ignore the vacuuming/laundry/chores/stuff you probably should do sometime this year. You’re a reviewer. That comes before anything!
12:15pm
Lunch. Usually something quick, easily grabbable from the fridge, and on occasion, nutritious. Also easily eaten, since you return to your chair with your food to continue the romance. You’re now over halfway through.
2:00pm
You find you dozed off. This is NOT a good sign for the review you’ll be writing. It failed to hold your interest. You make yourself a hot drink and determinedly pick up the book, good or bad, it has to be finished.
4:00pm
Success. Your reading is done - on this particular novel. You drag yourself out of the past (this was a historical novel, by the way), and turn your thoughts to dinner, cramming four hours of housework into twenty minutes - the approximate time it will take to defrost whatever it was you grabbed from the freezer. Your cat refuses to speak to you and your dog waits patiently by the microwave. Your goldfish has passed on due to lack of food and the terror of having the bored cat stare at it for three hours without blinking.
4:15pm
Flush the goldfish and check the mail. Find twelve more padded envelopes with books and manuscripts. Three bills. One reminder that your appointment with your optician is due. Since you’re starting to squint a bit and hold the books out at arm’s length in order to make the text legible, this is one reminder you decide to pay attention to.
6:00pm
Whip paper plates into trash and shove leftovers into plastic dishes for tomorrow’s lunch. Ignore the day’s newest arrivals, for now the moment has arrived for you to do what you do best… WRITE YOUR REVIEW.
7:00pm
Open your favorite word program and type the relevant information. Spend five minutes locating magnifying glass to read the always-unreadable ISBN number of the book. Curse whoever pasted the price tag over that number.
7:10pm
Think. How much of the plot should you reveal? What sort of rating are you going to assign it? Can you use the word “drivel” in an acceptable context?
7:30pm
Begin your review. Start by being pleasantly non-critical. Cite the last two books by this author (which actually weren’t too bad). Move to this book and allow a note of disappointment to creep into your words. Delete the words “Stupid twit” and replace with “Sadly naďve”. Delete the expression “grade A superjerk” and replace with “slightly overdone alpha tendencies”.
8:00pm
Curse luridly and repeat the process as a momentary computer glitch wipes everything out just as you realize you forgot to “SAVE” the bloody thing.
8:30pm
Done! Complete. Your review is now ready to be edited and uploaded, there to be enjoyed by the millions of readers who depend on you each month. Or so you’d like to think.
9:00pm
Complete uploading process, add the cover to the site files, and mark that book as “read”. Check the available titles in case you’ve missed one that’s coming up from a favorite author. Bypass the ebooks, since sitting at a computer and reading off the monitor wouldn’t do your back or your eyes any good, and seeing as YOU DON’T GET PAID FOR DOING THIS, you’re not about to spring for an ebook reader or a laptop computer.
10:00pm
Off to bed to catch up on that fallen novel you started the night before. This one’s a science fiction romance so maybe you’ll stay awake on a far-off planet! Who knows? You only know that there’s nothing you like to do more than read and review. It’s a calling and you’ve been called. Regardless of the fact that it’s all VOLUNTEER work, and the only perks are free books to review, it’s the job of your heart.
And you can’t imagine your life being any other way!
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