Hi, everyone. We're glad you're here. This is the Three Lesbians and a Pen podcast. Get ready to have your world rocked. As we dive into the wild and sometimes wacky world of self publishing. We are three fabulous bestselling authors. I'm your host, Kimberly Todd with my best friends.

K. C. Luck

and Jamey Moody. 

Join us as we discuss the joys of writing, challenges of self publishing, and anything else that tickles our fancy. 

Hey there. Welcome to episode 14 of the Three Lesbians and a Pen podcast. I'm Kimberly Todd and I'm here with my fabulous friends, KC Luck and Jamey Moody.

Today we're talking about reviews, but before we start we wanted to let you know that next week we are not going to have an episode because of the Thanksgiving holiday and we will rejoin you all back in the first week of December. How is everyone's week KC?

Well, I actually went to a wedding, which is always fun. My niece just got married and it was a great time. I took my girlfriend, which you never know how that's going to go over, but we were able to dance and then people joined us dancing, so it was like very open minded. You know, with the culture right now in the U.S. you just don't know how that's going to feel, but everybody was super welcoming.

We had a great time. And so I'm just feeling very positive about everything right now. So it was just a really good reaffirming, episode in my life.

Nice.

Fun. Yeah, that's great. Oh, let's see. It's my turn. I'm going to have to tell you about something I just did. I always play pickleball before we record these. And, I got back from pickleball and I went outside. I am writing a series right now that involves stars. And so every night I go out with my binoculars and I'll look at the stars because I have certain ones that I'm commenting on in the books.

Here's an interesting fact. Some stars when they're just coming out and they're low to the horizon because of the earth's atmosphere, they will twinkle red, white, blue, sometimes green, sometimes orange. They look like rainbow stars. And so you can imagine rainbow stars are a big frigging deal in these books.

Mm hmm. 

I went outside to look at the stars real quick because there's, a couple that are coming up that I wanted to see right at the very beginning. And I was so excited because they were twinkling rainbows. 

I had never seen that before. So it just made me very happy. 

It's a sign.

I know that's strange. But you'll have to read the books to learn more.

But it was really cool because, I learned that while doing research on it. And it's really kind of neat. If you go out, you'll look at some of the brighter stars, they'll twinkle rainbow.

Wow, I like that. 

It's friggin awesome. 

It does. It makes my heart happy.

I would go out right now and look at the stars, but I'd get hit in the face with pouring rain. I live in Oregon. It rains all the time. There are no stars to see until April. We're fine.

Oh, really? Bummer. But anyway, these particular stars are the ones I'm writing about and it was early for them and I was like, oh my god, they're rainbows too! It made me very happy. Okay, Kimberly.

We had a really nice weekend. We actually got to spend some time together because my wife has been working a lot over the weekends. We did a couple of romantic things, had a nice dinner. Yes. And, I've been working on my new book. That's really what I've been focusing on.

Oh, that's good.

Yes. 

Yeah,

That's it for me short this week... 

Can I make one comment? Okay, so we can see each other. I know that y'all can't see us and y'all just hear us. But I'm noticing over Kimberly's left shoulder 

she's got her Christmas ,

Oh, 

tree up and the lights are twinkling. 

Look at that. It's Christmas 

Look at you.

house. Oh,

I didn't even notice.

I just happened to see it. I had to comment.

What we 

don't tell people is that we actually drag it out and it's already made.

with that 

in and it's ready to 

Heck 

It's, all our ornaments and everything. We decorated it a couple of years ago, but we have space where we can just drag it and then drag it back out.

I love it.

good. 

Insta tree.

Well, it's very pretty and festive. So,

so cool. Yeah. Well, good.

We got some reader feedback, from Jules this week. It was regarding our question about reviews. And she says that she writes them. And it's a new thing for her. She didn't really understand the importance of them for independent authors. And she's in the process now of going back and writing reviews for a lot of the books that she's really enjoyed. So thank you, Jules, for all us authors.

Going back. Wow.

I liked that. She said, she's only going to write them for the ones that she liked. We really

appreciate that because if you don't like our books, it's fine. Just don't write a review, email us and tell 

Go easy on us, exactly.

Don't write the 

review.

No need to review.

and tell us what you didn't

One stars? Not necessary.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Don't worry about it.

She also emailed us and asked the question this week to us. How do you come up with your character names?

I come up with character names, by Googling occasionally depending on the age of my character. I will google what's popular name during that age range. And also I watch a lot of sports. So you'll see a lot of sports last names. Also my characters. I haven't done Kelsey yet, but it's probably coming up.

Oh, I have. How do you do yours, Kimberly? 

When I first started writing, I definitely used people's names and last names. I would mix them up. Like I used a friend of mine from college his last name. So people I know, or I will google like an English name, an English surname and then I get a list of them and then I pick one or I mix them together and that's how I come up with mine.

Like I have a vision of the character in my head and you can scroll through the names and you'll kind of say, oh, kind of that piece with this piece, that makes a perfect name. 

Yeah.

Yeah. I Google mine. One thing that I do is depending on how old they are, I will Google the, most popular names for somebody born in that year. You know, in that year and I'll look through them and if something, strikes me or something I like, then I'll write that down. 

 And then when I start a new book, I'll go and look at this list. And, another place I get them is from, cemeteries.

Ooh, 

macabre.

Yeah. 

um, well, well,

Do you walk the cemetery, or?

With your 

to say. 

notebook?

I was going to say, I go down to the cemetery where my family is buried from time to time, just to make sure everything's, you know, being taken care of.

And sometimes I will walk around in there because it's a pretty area and there's no traffic and I just kind of look at the names on, the tombstones and some of them are interesting. Yeah. And I'll take a little note in my phone. 

That's cool. 

I have trouble with last names. I don't have so much trouble with first names. Last names give me 

more trouble. 

Oh, really? It's opposite for me. I try not to use the same name over and over again. For a 

while, when I first 

started, they all started with A.

It's like, I can't get past A in the alphabet, apparently.

Do you ever notice that you do that? You'll make a character, a main character, and later on in the book you'll do a supporting character that you needed to add, and it's the same initial, and you screw yourself up. You're like, wait, who am I talking about now?

Like, you just said A and A.

Change that name.

Seven 

A main character names. You know, I got Anna and Ashley. It's just like, what the hell? You know? What were you smoking? 

That's like an unwritten rule.

Don't do 

it. 

start with A.

You want me to go on we had several emails. Okay. Cheryl emailed us and wished me a happy belated birthday. So thank you, Cheryl. We were talking last week about, books in a series. And I mentioned something that the second and third books, won't always have the read through that the first one does.

And she commented that the second and third books are a lot of times are her favorites. So I get 

that. 

Usually better books in some ways because you already have 

well developed characters. 

Yeah, and the world is built, so it's easier.

Then Robin reached out to us. So this is just a lovely email. She said she's been trying to send positive messages and comments to favorite LGBTQ content creators over the past week, since a lot of people are feeling discouraged.

She wanted to say how much she enjoys the podcast . And she's listened to every episode and really appreciates the short format of it. And, a few weeks ago, she did a sample edit for a new author that was new to Sapphic Publishing. And, she immediately told them about our podcast and, hoping that it would be helpful. 

Yeah. 

All right. 

So that was just so sweet. Because that's why we want to do it, you know?

And.

Yeah. Everybody who's listening, please tell someone else and we'll start trickling down. Yeah.

And then we got an email from Evie and she thanked us for making the podcast. She said it's become a comfort listen.

That's why we want to do it.

She said as far as the author question. She said, yes, she's an author. She reads all her reviews for now. She says as an eager beaver debut author, she said, however, I feel I'll learn my lesson someday.

Don't touch that stove. Don't do that.

Yeah. So sometimes that happens. And, she also, gave us a few suggestions for, future episodes and then, asked another question about, this one's pretty good.

She said she was fascinated and nosy about the discussion regarding age gaps in our own lives, and she wondered if, the couples in our stories are reflected of actual relationships past or present.

And, were we answering that, or are

Well, I'm just going to say, I'm just going to say yes and leave 

it at that. 

Me too! 

Yes, uh, uh huh.

Yes! Uh huh! 

Yes, 

Moving on. 

Some major age gaps, but okay.

Then I'm going to throw it to KC because you had a text.

I had a text. 

I had one, one text. So There's my tear. You can't see it,

There's a violin playing.

 I got one. Cheryl is, you know, Cheryl is keeping me afloat here on the 

texting. She's awesome from Memphis, Tennessee. And she said nice things about my Billionaire series, which was super, super sweet.

And then she says that she rates the books, which I think a lot of people don't realize on the Kindle, it pops up and it says, rate the book, when you're at the end and you just click five stars for my books, of course.

And 

all our books, please.

Yes. Okay. For all our books. Fine. Thank you. All our books. But then there's really no place to really leave her review easily. And so a lot of people think that's enough, but actually, Cheryl had mentioned that she will now start leaving reviews because she realizes how much more important it is.

And after this episode, you'll really understand why.

I read on my iPad and I use the Kindle app to do that and the same thing will come up at the end of the book it'll give you the chance to star. Does it not give you a link though to go and leave a review if you 

want to?

Yeah, but who's gonna click a link? Come on now.

Yeah.

I read mine on my phone and it just does the five star thing 

right away. 

So that's it. Correct.

Yep. That's all our reader feedback. Thank you, and I can't wait to read the emails next week that I know I'll be 

getting.

Yes. Brag, brag, brag. She's getting all these emails. Not getting any 

text.

No, I'm just being very 

thankful.

Oh, okay. Fine.

We're bringing up the rear with the Insta and the text KC.

I know. It's true. It's true.

Hey, reader feedback's reader feedback. We don't care how you give it to us, just give it to 

us.

Okay. That's fair. 

Very true. Plus I like when you read it. It's easier.

Yeah, exactly. Let Jamey do all reading. Mine are super short. They're

texts. 

And you're, And 

you're, so good at it. So, 

you know, 

Put a lot of emotion into it. It's awesome.

 So this week we're talking about reviews. And KC, would you like to start us off?

Yes, I will. So reviews on Amazon, we're specifically talking about Amazon, I think, although Goodreads reviews are also great, but when it comes to book sales, Amazon reviews are very important because there is an algorithm that Amazon has for everything it sounds like in the world. And one of them, does impact you based on reviews.

So, there's this magical unicorn number. I don't know if it's true or not, but some people believe that if you hit 50 reviews, then Amazon will start showing your book to more people, which may be true. I'm not sure, but the more reviews, the better that has proven to be true. So yeah, the whole point behind reviews is not only to tell other people about your book, but also to tell the great Zon that we have a book out there and we'd like you to share it with the world.

And also to KC's point, you might see authors once in a while in their newsletter, write, " Hey, have you read my book? Would you mind leaving a review?" And that's one of the reasons why it helps them to get that algorithm kicked in. So, you'll see that in their newsletters a lot of times.

And then reviews always translate to more money. So, I mean, to be honest, the more reviews you get, the more it's showed to people, the more money you're going to make. So, it helps the author a lot if you leave a review.

It, does. But, if you don't like the book, like we said earlier, don't leave the review. Email us directly and tell us what you didn't like. Because one thing you need to understand is reviews are subjective and you can't please everybody. You got to keep that in mind because reviews sting. Bad reviews sting.

There's no doubt about it. And imposter syndrome will definitely slap you in the face when you read a bad review, but you just have to remember you can't please everybody. And that's just one person. And you try to go on.

Yes, bad reviews are hard, but they're even worse when they actually target the author and not the book. So, some people write reviews that are wonderful about critiquing the book showing you where there's good points and maybe some of the low points And those are great reviews as long as they don't talk about the author. But I'm gonna read you the last sentence of one of my reviews on the billionaire series the last sentence.

Are you ready? It says, "I hope I remember this author's name so I don't ever again read something that leaves such a bad taste in my mouth."

Ooh,

Yikes. I hope they don't remember your 

name. 

Oh my gosh!

So yeah, that's one of the reasons I don't write billionaire series very much right now.

Yeah, I,

Oh, come on now, KC. You know, that's not true.

But targeting the 

author 

person. Here, let me talk you up. Let me talk you 

right out of that. 

Yeah. There's 700 reviews on there, and I would say 650 of them are really good. But, I'm just saying, don't target the author like that. That's just 

not cool. 

Oh yeah. 

yeah. 

There's a saying that your mom probably taught you. If you don't have something good to say, don't say it at all. And you can just shut the book, or whatever. You don't need to take time to go log in and write something that's hurtful. Because it is a person that wrote that book. And it probably took them a long time to write it and get it out there.

So, negative things like that are not helpful.

And that's why I say email us because our books, you'll find our email addresses in there. And if you need to get that off your chest, you know, email us, tell us, but don't put it out there, in case other readers might enjoy it. Look at the other reviews. Other readers are enjoying the book.

So you kind of have to think about that.

Yeah. There were seven helpful votes on that review. I know. I know. 

It just 

You're hurting me. You are hurting me, KC. Dang.

Oh, man.

My favorite is I had one person write a, I thought a very not flattering review. And then what happened was it was like the person wanted to get notoriety for themselves. So the people weren't commenting on my book or anything to do with the book at all, but they were commenting on that person's writing of the review.

Do you know what I mean? Like critiquing her review and saying, what a great reviewer. Oh, fabulous. Or whatever. And I thought that is so bizarre to me, but okay. You know, you just move on in that case. You're like, this is just not, I shouldn't be looking at this.

I know it's true. Yeah, it's hard not to, though.

Some that are interesting to me though, the review sounds really great and they'll only give you like three 

stars.

Yeah, it’s confusing. 

Or they say, they give you two, one or two stars and like, yeah, I read all the way through the end of the book and it never got any better. Well, stop reading. I mean, if it's that bad to you, stop, save yourself some time.

Or they do that covert thing where they'll put four stars, but in the body of the review they'll put right at the very beginning before they write anything, 2. 5. 

Yeah. 

I don't understand 

that. 

I'll tell you something that's fun about reviews though, that I get from some of mine is they will mention something in the book that they enjoyed, maybe some specific scene or something specific in the book, and I love that because maybe it wasn't that big a deal to me.

But they'll say something that I didn't think, might be so important, but it was to them. And so I love that. It makes it fun.

It does. And it helps because you can only put so much in the blurb. But then, if the reviewer realizes this is an age gap, which I apparently write more than I realize, they'll put, this is a great age gap, and you're like, wow, it's not in the blurb at all. But now the other people reading the reviews will realize that this is an age gap story.

And, if you're writing a series in the first book, maybe you think of a side character as not that big of a deal. And then you find out in book one that people really love and you're like, really? You really like that person that much? And there are like several readers are going in the reviews and writing about that character.

That helps because then you know, in book two or three, you could be like, do more or a spinoff with that particular character.

Mm hmm. And something else I love too, is, when they'll put a sentence or two in there about the book. and what I'm trying to say and they get it. And that just pleases me to no end, because I'm like, okay, you got it. Because I'm not necessarily trying to put some deep message in there 

or anything like that or trying to make them have to find something necessarily. But when they get it, it just is so pleasing. And, it makes you feel good.

Totally makes you feel good. Yes. 

And the only other thing is when they say, I really enjoyed this book. It took me away from a bad day or something like that. And then you're like, Oh, that's those are the best ones.

I think. 

The ones that say the ultimate escape, because that's my brand, and people know what they're going to get when they get one of my books. Oh, I'll tell you what that reminds me though. I got the best review on this last book. One of the reviewers called me the queen of low angst, heartwarming, sweet,

Nice.

a sapphic romance.

Oh my God. And so of course I immediately went and took a piece of that review and made a promo out it to put on social media. 

media. good idea. Exactly. 

And 

and she said thanks for doing that and I said my God you called me 

a queen. Of course I have to do that. You're being called a queen of

anything. We gotta get you a crown.

There you go. 

fucking awesome.

Thank you reader, whoever you are. Mm

 I will make promos out of reviews, too that's always nice because they're the ones that are saying it. You don't have to continually say hey, this book is great because I wrote it. Please go read 

it. 

 Yeah, it's true. And I've also noticed that those people that review every book, and there's some that are repeat reviewers, are also people that are giving you good word of mouth. They're also the ones on social media that are promoting you, or they're telling their friends or whatever. Cause I mean, like Cheryl, let's be honest, like Cheryl is one of our people that's actually listened to the podcast and give us great feedback.

And so, and Jules. 

And Jules is another good one. And those people who leave reviews, continually are actually really good fans and they're the best. 

They're the very best.

Yeah. And it's so nice to know that they're following every week. Mm hmm. One other thing I want to mention about reviews is there are three or four, big sapphic readers that love, all parts of the sapphic genre and they do reviews and they post them and it's their thing. Just like our thing is, writing books, it's their thing to review books.

And so you can reach out to them. I have two, probably three that, I send an ARC copy to and just simply say, if you have time to read it and want to review it, that's great. That just helps get the word out because a lot of people or readers will, be waiting for their reviews, to see about the book and everything.

And that can lead to more sales. So you have more readers.

Yeah. There's a couple that come to mind. Of course The Lesbian Review is a big one. That's a huge site. That's what's in their name. Actually. The Lesbian, The Lesbian Review would have reviews, obviously, but another one is, Jude in the Stars. 

Do you give her ARC copies? Yeah. her reviews are amazing.

I mean, if you can get her to review your book, that's a big feather in the cap, so definitely.

And there's Women Using Words, something like 

that. I can't remember. Deb does those. She is a great to review my books and Caz. They also have a, every other Saturday, I believe a book club.

And they go on there, but Caz is the one who called me a queen.

So I loved it. I know I loved it. But it's like I said, you've got a brand going on out there and it just, fortifies so the reader knows, okay, this is the kind of, and you know what, I know my books aren't for everybody and that's fine, but I want them to know if you're going to get one of my books, this is what you're going to get.

One thing I thought about too, which I don't do, and I'm sure, I don't know if you guys do, or maybe you tried it when you first started, but there's places where you can pay for a review, which, you know, like Kirkus and a bunch of other places. I've never done that. And I was wondering if you guys have ever done it.

No. 

Yeah. And also, that's another thing that you have to be careful with. You want to just have regular organic reviews like we're talking about, because, if Amazon ever thought that you were, you know, trying to bribe people into a review or getting too many of your friends and family that are in the same, area is you, they might pick up on that and it could be trouble for you.

Yeah. Yeah. Same with other authors. Yeah. I have to be careful if only authors are reviewing you, they kind of say, oh, this is an author reviewing an author. And they'll be like, I'm not posting that review. 

yeah. 

 When you're purchasing a book to read, do you look at reviews? 

I read like the first two. And then I read the blurb because if the blurb doesn't entice me, then I won't, choose the book. But if I like the blurb, I'll probably read the book regardless of what the reviews say. And the same with movies. You know how Rotten Tomatoes can sometimes say a movie stinks and then you watch it and you like it.

So

I do not read the reviews. I feel they're too subjective that people that review them are not necessarily looking for the same thing I'm looking for, but I do look at the number of reviews, to make sure that, it's actually popular enough that people are at least reading it. So I know that's probably not the best way to approach it, but yeah, the higher the number of reviews, the more likely I am ratings and reviews to, have me actually read it.

I don't know that I really glance at the reviews either. Maybe, but really it's the cover and the blurb.

If that interests me, then I'll get the book and read it. And then I might look at a review, but I don't think it would influence me if the blurb and the cover had me. It wouldn't influence me not to give it a try.

Yeah. That blurb is super important for me. 

How do you handle if you get a negative review? How do you handle that if you happen to read it?

Tequila! Yeah.

I was going to say, if I was a drinker, but since I’m not.

I swear at the computer, like the person is there, like, tell them off and then I'm fine. 

I'll reach out sometimes maybe to my sister or somebody and say, read this review. Do you

just, 

you believe that?

Or I would reach out to one of y'all. I've done that before. Remember on that three star review and the review was so good. I was like, I'm not getting this. So anyway, I reach out and then I take a deep breath and move on.

We're all acknowledging we do read our reviews but I don't read all my reviews. I'm really careful, after getting really down, in the very beginning of my career, I read all the reviews, which I would not recommend to anyone who is writing. I would recommend reading the first few reviews because it will give you a heads up if something's wrong.

For example, you know, you don't want that review that says this was a great book, but chapter three is missing. You may want to pick up on that and fix it.

I was going to say, that's what an ARC team does for me. They're the ones that'll tell me before it goes out if there's something wrong. But, I do check the reviews, though, to check and see if my ARC team's doing their job and putting their reviews out there, because that's kind of part of the deal. So I check them for that, but, I read most of them, I'll say. 

I read most of mine for sure. 

Yeah. 

And if you ever have imposter syndrome, that's where you need to go. Go read your five star reviews. Get 

over it. 

But it's hard not to click on that one star, just to 

see.

I guess that's true.

It's weird how the mind works too, because let's say the books new, you have a hundred fantastic reviews, and there's like one three star, right? And you're like, you read it and then you just get the whole thing. Your whole mind is on that one 

three star...

Yeah, I suck. There's 700 good reviews and one that says, you know, that I stink.

What is up with that? 

Well, I will say this. Some of them, if they're giving you a not so great review and the criticism is constructive, that's one thing because I think we want each book to be better than the last one. I know I do. And so if they point something out to me and I'm going, Oh man, I didn't think about that.

Or I didn't realize that, then that can be helpful.

Yeah. 

I don't mind that as much. It doesn't make the review sting 

as much.

I prefer an email 

if Yeah. 

something 

like 

that. But if you want to put in a review, that's fine. If you want to point out the fact I used Flutter like 63 times in my book, that's fine. But yeah, I prefer an email.

 I had one from an ARC reader that said, this was a great book and I loved all of this and everything, but they sure did smirk 

a lot.

Ha ha ha, exactly, ha, 

ha ha, note to self,

less smirking. 

Eyebrows or 

winks? 

That's what my editor will do too. They're furrowing their brows a lot in that scene. 

I'm like, OK. 

Yeah, 

I'll work on that.

exactly, 

Yeah. 

That's why editors are fun

Well, I think That's all we have for this week for reviews.

Thank you for

reviewing. 

Yes.

Oh 

my gosh, yes. 

Yeah. Thank you.

Thank you 

Yes. 

Those numbers matter. 

numbers matter 

And, the week of December 1st, we're going to be talking about sex scenes.

Woohoo! 

That's right. 

Bom chicka bow bow! 

That's because Evie asked us sex scenes. Do y'all enjoy writing them?

Any rituals or methods when writing them?

We're not giving away 

anything. 

She it. Yeah, she wants an episode on spicy stuff.

Okay, we'll bring the heat, to warm everybody up in this cold climate. For those who are in the coldest part of the world, it's time for sex. Yeah. So you want the question? You want the question? Now that we know what the sexy topic is going to be. So, okay, we're just going to assume you read sex scenes, but what do you like to read in your sex scene?

So give me a text on that. I'd like to see that in 50 characters or less. That'd be great. And also, for those who are actually authors that are listening, do you like to write them? I know there's really mixed bag on that and the next episode we have, we'll talk amongst ourselves about how we feel about it.

I don't give anything away, but yes, do you like to write sex scenes?

Please feel free to email because you have all the space you need there.

Well, that's it for this week. Thank you so much for listening.

Thank you.

Yes, and don't forget we won't be here next week, so thank y'all for listening. Bye 

Thanks for listening. If you'd like to reach out to us, you can contact us by email at contact@threelesbiansandapen.com with the number three spelled out or on Instagram, Facebook and X at Three Lesbians and a Pen using the number three. And finally on our website, at threelesbiansandapen.com, we look forward to hearin