Review of Penance. A Love Story by Sarah Buhl

“We may make bad choices, but we don’t have to let them define us.”
Penance. A Love Story is the debut novel by author Sarah Buhl, and I have to say that it’s probably one of the most impressive and captivating romances I have ever read. Ms. Buhl has a way with words that is beyond beautiful and their construction is so poetic that I found myself on more than one occasion thinking, Wow. When a writer is passionate about a story, it’s written all over their work, and it’s obvious that Ms. Buhl has a true passion for the truly fantastic story she’s written in Penance.

Penance is the story of Wynn Hawthorne and Hannah Anderson, two young, very broken people who have both faced incredible pain in their lives inflicted by tragedy and abuse. Hannah is dealing with the death of her sister, which she blames on herself, while Wynn is dealing with the effects of years of mental and physical abuse at the hands of his own mother. In order to cope with their pain, both of them constructed emotional walls to keep the rest of the world out. But when they meet each other, they can’t deny their connection and, together, they embark on a journey of love, forgiveness and healing.

“There’s so much I want to say, but the words are hollow compared to the feelings I have when I’m near you.”

“We all have to face our demons, Hannah, if we don’t, they eat us up inside and steal every breath away.”

I’m not usually a highlighter of quotes when I read, unless I find something that moves me to the point where I feel compelled to commit it to memory. Typically, this will only happen once every few books, and I may only find one or two quotes to highlight. In Penance, however, I found myself wanting to highlight something on practically every other page. There were so many passages that resonated with me and made me think.

The characters in Penance are both relatable, believable, and well-developed. Besides Wynn and Hannah, I particularly liked Sid, Petra, Gabe, and Maggie, all of whom were great supporting characters and, at times, provided some comic relief in a novel about otherwise serious issues. I’ve never read a book like Penance before, and found the plot to be extremely well-developed. It flowed together well, and it was both emotional and heartbreaking at times (to the point where I found myself tearing up).

In short, Penance is a truly moving, beautifully written and well-constructed novel of forgiveness and love that I will not soon forget. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a great new romance or just a well-written, moving story in general.

Getting Past a Negative Review Without Becoming a Raging Alcoholic

 

I wish I could be like Shaw who once read a bad review of one of his plays, called the critic and said: 'I have your review in front of me and soon it will be behind me. -Barbra Streisand

 
From my close observation of writers...they fall into two groups: 1) those who bleed copiously and visibly at any bad review, and 2) those who bleed copiously and secretly at any bad review.  -- Isaac Asimov

When I was in elementary school, I remember sitting in on a presentation about bullying and kindness. Although I can’t remember most of what was drilled into my young, impressionable mind that day -- or much of anything now that I’ve reached the third decade of my life, for that matter -- one thing did stick with me. In that presentation, an insult was labeled as a cold prickly, while a compliment was called a warm fuzzy (stick with me, I promise I have a point here). In short, it was reiterated repeatedly that when you present a person with one cold prickly (an insult) it takes approximately twenty or so warm fuzzies (compliments) to undo the damage your one cold prickly caused. Ever since learning this little tidbit, I’ve carried it with me, later finding it to have been the most important lesson I learned in the third grade. Years later, as a writer and recipient of not-always-so-wonderful reviews, that one lesson holds all the more meaning. For despite all the positive comments and reviews I’ve received, I find myself focusing on only the negative, allowing those words to define my work.

As writers, we have to separate our feelings from our work product. I know it’s easier said than done, but if we are to thrive in our chosen profession (or hobby), then we can’t allow our egos to become bruised or somehow believe that a negative review is at all related to who we are as people. In short, we must put on our big girl or boy pants and carry on.

And because negative reviews happen to literally EVERY writer at some point, I’ve assembled a list of ways that we can keep said pants on to cope when a less than awesome one comes in.


Never, Ever, Under Any Circumstance, Comment On It

It’s only natural to want retaliate when hurt feelings are involved. However, we writers must refrain from defending our honor and accept the fact that customers pay for our work and are entitled to voice their opinions on it, whether favorable or not. For someone to argue with or belittle a reviewer after they’ve taken the time to read and review their work is both unprofessional and guaranteed to land the offending author’s reputation in the toilet. Not to mention, it does nothing to help the cause of other indie authors, who only have their body of work and online reputation to build their readership.


Congratulate Yourself, You’re Officially An Author

No traditionally published or popular indie novel has all four and five star reviews. Every single one of them have one and two star reviews to go along with all the glowing ones. Don’t believe me? Do a search on Amazon and see for yourself. Because I can pretty much guarantee you that any novel with over 100 reviews has at least one or two less than stellar ones amid its heaps of praise. So wear your one and two stars proudly, authors. After all, you’re in good company.

You Can’t Make Everyone Happy

There has yet to be that one novel that everyone universally loves; one that’s so perfect that no one can criticize it. We can only do so much as writers. No matter how polished our writing may be, no matter how flawless the story, no matter how much editing we do, there will always be someone unaffected by our work. Everyone has different tastes, and two people can read the same thing and draw entirely different conclusions on it. Such is life. Suck it up and drive on.

Look For The Hidden Gem

Believe it or not, there is such a thing as a good negative review. What’s so good about them, you ask? Well, for starters, for every one ‘this book sucks’ review, there are usually two or three negative ones of substantive value. If you can swallow your pride long enough to read them, of course. The truth is, no one’s perfect, and we all make mistakes. But it’s only those who learn from their mistakes, those who take the constructive criticisms in those reviews and use them to their advantage, who are able to improve upon their writing, and eventually turn their critics into fans. Take the time to take in every less than glowing comment about your book’s sentence structure, usage of adjectives, character development, plot, and dialogue, store them in a mental filing cabinet, and pull them back out when you’re writing your next book. I guarantee you won’t make the same mistakes again.

Quit Stalking Your Reviews

I have to say that this is one of the hardest pieces of advice for anyone, myself included, to take. In fact, I regularly stalk myself on Amazon and Goodreads to see whether I have a new review. If I see that I do, my pulse automatically quickens and I get a little sick to my stomach at the possibility of the review being a negative one. Thankfully, most of the time they have been pretty positive, but there have been a few times where I found myself reading something that completely ruined my day. In the beginning, they really bothered me, mostly because they affirmed all my insecurities about myself and my abilities as a writer. But then I realized that the only reason why they bothered me so much was because I’d become a victim of those insecurities, and that if I didn’t allow them to bother me, I could move on and get over myself. So, I got over it, knowing that although I’m nowhere near perfect, my insecurities are just that: MY insecurities. The reality is that I love writing. It provides me with release, and no amount of negativity, warranted or otherwise, is going to stop me from doing something that I love.

Use It As Incentive To Make Your Writing Better

If you’re stubborn and hardheaded like I am, when someone tells you something negative, you make it a point to do whatever you can to prove them wrong. This is especially true when applied to reviews. Whether helpful or not, use the review to improve upon your writing. Take the criticisms with you into your next book and think back on them. Were they warranted? Do you actually use too many adjectives? Is your dialogue really flat? If it was before, I’d be willing to bet that it won’t be anymore. Make it your goal to improve upon your writing with every book you write. Eventually, you’ll prove to your detractors that they were wrong about you.

Have a Good Cry, Laugh, Eat a Pint of Triple Chocolate Brownie Fudge Ice Cream (not necessarily in that order)

I’m a big fan of feeling sorry for myself for a few minutes, letting it get out of my system, and then moving on again. In my younger years, this would have required a glass -- oh, who am I kidding, a bottle -- of wine, or anything covered in chocolate. Today, I’m just a tad more health conscious and just stick with sulking around the house for a little bit before I force myself to pick up what I was doing before the offending review appeared, acting like it never happened at all.

Never Give Up

This is probably the most generic advice out there, but I’m going to include it here anyway. I know that I’ve personally read a few comments that have really stung; comments that have made me question why I write at all. Although it’s easy and only natural to want to shut yourself down and say that you’re done, you can’t let the opinion of a couple of people wipe away those of the rest of your reviewers (or that one cold prickly overshadow your mountain of warm fuzzies).


Writers, how do you get over a negative review? Do they bother you or do you allow them to just roll off your shoulders?

　

　

　

Putting on the Big Author Panties/My Favorite Review Thus Far

I posted this as a rant on my Facebook page, and decided to share it on my blog as well.

 

The following review came in this morning on Amazon and Goodreads and had me sweating bullets ever since I noticed that the blogger had marked Enigma Black as “currently reading” on Goodreads. Why was I so anxious? This blogger is known for her brutally honest reviews. In fact, her reviews are so honest that authors whose books she didn’t care for began seeking retribution against her on her we...bsite, giving her books (yes, she’s an author, too) negative reviews even though they’ve never read them. As an author, this behavior by fellow authors sickens me. For starters, you never, ever comment on a poor review (no matter how much it bothers you) and you most definitely never act like a middle schooler and take your frustrations out on someone purely because they were expressing their own opinion. After all, isn’t that what we indie authors are looking for, an honest, unbiased opinion of our work? It irritates me that this particular blogger has had to hide her identity from the public just so she can safely review the books that she PAID for. This just goes to show you that not everyone is ready to hear the truth. Heck, even traditionally published books receive poor reviews. Take any of the Harry Potter books, for example. Do a search on Amazon and I’ll guarantee you that you won’t find a single book in that series that doesn’t have at least one 1* review. “Well, that reviewer must be crazy,” you say. No. It’s just that the book didn’t resonate with them. And that’s completely okay. Just because someone goes against the grain and gives their honest opinion on how THEY feel about a book doesn’t give anyone the liberty to go batshit crazy on them. After all, as indies we have a hard enough time finding reviews and readers for our books. Let’s not taint that further by acting unprofessional.

And, yes, I would still have made this rant even if this blogger had hated Enigma Black.  And, no, I've never spoken to this blogger before, nor do I know who she is, but I'm going to take her up on her offer to contact her on her blog's FB page.

Here is the review from blogger evilicious whose blog is called The Good, The Bad and the Ugly:

"Obviously - given my rating - I love this book. I was torn between a 4 and a 5 star.

I am leaning toward a 5 star but there were a few issues for me that made it a 4 star. Mind you - I LOVED the story overall.

THE GOOD:

The plot was brilliant, and totally sucked me in. I love stories that are pure escapism - and this was one of those. There were plenty of twists and turns (which I love) . Some were predictable but others weren't. I was not expecting what happened in the last few chapters at all - well I kind of was - but I thought it would involve a different character.

The characters are well drawn, and relatable, the story flowed nicely and was well written. A few minor editing issues, but I have seen worse in traditionally published books.

BTW - ending was a cliff-hanger. You figure this out as you get toward the end of the book so it's not jarring, and it's not the sort of cliffhanger that annoys the crap out of you. Actually I started to worry the author was going to sell herself short (for purely selfish reasons) leading up to the climax, and that it would be a complete read.(Phew!)

THE BAD:

Overall I loved the story but it took me a bit to get into for two reasons (but then BAM! Suddenly I was zooming through the pages like nothing else). The dialogue was overly lengthy at some points and was slightly 'off' character if that makes sense, at times. I guess it was sometimes a little formal compared to the narrative. I think there should have been a little more world building to help readers suspend disbelief *SPOILER ALERT (sort of) a nationwide curfew is imposed and I kind of went 'WTF - as if! It would take a lot more than that' , so strengthening this earlier in the story would help, though as I got further into the book there was more to back this up and strengthen it END (the-sort-of-spoiler) ALERT *

There were also a couple of areas where the wording didn't work. One that comes to mind is 'few' meaning three, but the author used it to mean two. Little things like that suck me out of a story.

IN FACT - I think the author might want to do one final edit, taking some of my points into account, and those of other reviewers as I have a feeling this one will rocket up the Kindle charts as word gets out! And we all know how nasty some reviewers can be when a book suddenly gains popularity. (Note to author, feel free to contact me via my FB page if you would like more clarification - I really do think you are onto something here and you should be proud of your achievement. [...] Being an author myself (and no dear reader - I am not about to tastelessly link my books - or even my author name) I understand how easy it is for these things to slip through in the editing process.

THE UGLY:

Nothing - because despite my few issues (I like to show both sides) this is a brilliant story that sucked me in and the issues obviously weren't enough to stop me reading. In fact I couldn't read it fast enough. An absolute page turner that kept me up late into the - er - morning, and one I wouldn't be surprised to see snapped up by movie producers in the near future. First time I ever said THAT about an indie book!"

Brought to you by Evilicious Book Reviews: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly