My Book Rating System Explained

Deciding how many stars to award a book used to be really difficult for me. Because when there's only five levels to choose from, things get complicated. A book may deserve a 4 star rating for its characters, but a 2 star rating for it's plot and pacing. Or it may deserve 1 star for it's plot and pacing, yet 4 stars for the writing quality. So I quickly devised a little strategy to make book rating so much easier, and today I thought I'd share it with you guys. I know that sometimes I'll review a book and people have questioned my star rating based on the review, so hopefully this post will clarify things.

I actually work out the star ratings in quite a logical way. Each star represents one element of the book, aside from personal enjoyment, which earns two stars. I break it down into characters, plot, writing quality and then personal enjoyment for the final two. So, for example, The Maze Runner by James Dashner earned 2/5 stars from me. Broken down, it equals:

 

0.5 stars for character development

0.5 stars for plot

0 stars for writing quality

1 star for overall personal enjoyment.

 

Another example is Looking For Alaska by John Green. I gave this book 5/5 stars, so broken down it was made up from:

 

1 star for character development

1 star for plot

1 star for writing quality

2 stars for overall personal enjoyment

 

I've found it so much easier to rate my books through this system, as it leads to a more all-round rating without my feelings getting in the way. Because sometimes I've read books that I've enjoyed for whatever reason that might have a rubbish plot. Or I might absolutely adore the characters but hate the plot and writing. This way things just even out to be more accurate.

 

I hope that you liked this post, and that it was straight-forward enough to understand! How do you rate books for your book reviews?

 

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