The argument for #DNF (did not finish)

I seem to find myself embroiled in a few doozies of online chats of late. The most current one involves a bunch of reviewers and authors debating the DNF option of Netgalley and Booksprout.

I happen to do reviews for Netgalley and put my books up on both sites to garner reviews, so I know how both systems work.

Many times on Netgalley I have received a 1 star review and then the reviewer has said they did not finish the book. This seems unrealistically unfair to me.

I have no problem with a reader not finishing it. Not every book is for every reader and I do my own share of DNF’ing. What I object to is Netgalley allowing a rating on a book that was not read to completion. They have a DNF button on the site for reviewers to use. Why some people don’t is beyond me. Same thing goes for Goodreads. Why review a book you didn’t finish? Just to tell people that you didn’t like it? Again, sounds a little nasty, doesn’t it?

I sincerely don’t mind a DNF on my work. In fact, I would prefer it to an abysmal rating that destroys my ranking on Amazon and Goodreads.

I don’t think I’m the only author who feels this way, either.