What can I expect in your reviews?
Every review on here will start off with five things: a picture of the cover, the audience level (or who the book is geared toward), the genre, how the book was obtained, and the reviewer's name. After that, there will be a brief paragraph or two that describes what the book is about. Following the summary, the book will be rated on a 10 point scale and then reviewed with what we liked, disliked, found good or not so good, etc. One reviewer, Nic Echo, will also have a small paragraph reviewing the cover. All individual book reviews will be completed by showing what we plan on reading next.
More On...
LevelsEach book review will state the audience level it was intended for or is suitable for. The four categories are Youth, Teen, Older Teen, and Adult.
Youth
Geared for children up to age twelve or thirteen. Books in this level have a lower reading level. Violence will be minimal, and sexual themes will be practically nonexistent - nothing more than kissing.
Teen
Geared for those ages twelve to about fifteen or sixteen. Books in this level may have a higher reading level than youth. Violence may be more prominent than a youth book yet will still maintain a fairly low level. Themes may be darker in nature. Sexual content and themes will remain low - little more than kissing and snogging/making out.
Older Teen
Geared toward those ages sixteen and up. Books in this level may have a higher reading level than teen. Violence may be mild to medium in nature, but no excessive details. Sexual content may appear, but again, no excessive detail. Themes in this level may get pretty dark or heavy. Drug and alcohol use can also appear in books of this level.
Adult
Geared toward those eighteen and over. The reading level may reach to college level. Violence, sexual content, themes, and drug and alcohol use can vary from youth setting to older teen. This level is more for the reading level than anything else.
Explicit Lite
Although intended for adults, it may also be fine for some older teens. Sex, violence, drugs/alcohol, and language will be in the book somewhere, but will be lighter in tone than our explicit rating.
Explicit
Adults only! These are books geared specifically toward adults and will contain one or more of the following: high sex content, large amount of foul language, strong and excessive amounts of gore/violence, and certain amounts of drug and alcohol use.
If you have questions as to why we placed a book at a certain level, feel free to ask
CoversHere at Series, Snarks, and Stand Alones, we post the covers we held in our actual hand (unless otherwise noted) or ebook. You get to see what covers we held: the beautiful, the laughable, and mediocre.
As of Aug 29th, 2012, Nic Echo has added a small paragraph dedicated to the book cover in all of his reviews. All cover reviews prior to Aug 29th, 2012 can be found here. Please, be aware that the cover reviews do not reflect on the rating we give the book. The rating is for the content within the book's pages only.
The Rating ScaleHere at SSSA, we use a ten point scale. Although it's simple enough (10 being the best), here is a more detailed viewing of how our scale works.
10 Absolutely fantastic!
This book will more than likely be read several times. It's both well written and engrossing. This is a book that would be highly recommended to a wide array of people. Definitely worth the time and the money!
9 Brilliant read!
Although not an absolute favourite, it will more than likely be reread several times in life as well. Worth both the time and the money, this is another book that we would highly recommend.
8 Very good read
Perhaps not as engrossing as it could be, it was still well enjoyed. It is likely to be reread, but then again, maybe not. Although it is worth the time (and even the money), you will not see us recommending this everywhere we go.
7 It's good
Not the most engrossing read ever, but it was still well liked. Neither time nor money felt wasted. Although not highly likely to, we would still recommend the book to some. Will we reread this? Maybe, but not likely.
6 Not bad
It's a little better than okay. It's not a waste of time, and it's not a complete waste of money, but it would be highly unlikely for us to read this again. As for recommendations, you won't find us recommending this, but you won't find us trying to convince you not to read it either.
5 Meh ... it's okay
Although it wasn't a waste of time, money would be better spent elsewhere. If you want to read it, we'd suggest borrowing it from a friend or the library. Again, we won't try and stop you from reading it, but we won't be recommending it either.
4 It's tolerable
Not worth the money and barely worth the time, but it's not bad enough to stay completely away from. However, if you insist on reading it, get it from the library.
3 Let's face it. It's bad.
This is a book that is not worth the time and definitely not worth the money. Although we'd suggest you read elsewhere, we won't try extensively to get you to look elsewhere either.
2 Why are you reading this?
It may not be the worst literature out there, but boy is it close. Save your time. Save your money. In fact, don't even think of buying it. This is a book we would try to get you not to read. It could be because of poor plot, poor characters, poor writing, or a variation. Whatever the reason, we suggest you stay clear.
1 It would make better kindling
The rating saved for the worst of the worst - the kind that are so bad they are laughable (or make you wish you had brain bleach). Stay away from this literary sore. We swear to you that it is that bad. This is a book that we would highly suggest not reading it. Your time can be spent doing much better things.
DNF
Did not finish. Whether it was that bad or that boring, we were unable to finish enough of this book to even give it a rating of some sort.
Series, Trilogies, and SpoilersWell, you know what you can expect from an individual book review from us, but what about the books that are part of series or trilogies? As most of you are aware, the farther you get into a series, the more tight knit things can become. Now, there are some series that are made of mostly stand alone type books that refer to earlier novels (IE Sookie Stackhouse or Anita Blake), but then there are also series that are basically one long story (IE Cirque du Freak or Blue Bloods). Whether the former or the latter, we at SSSA will do our best to write a spoiler free review. However, if we are unable to review the book without using spoilers (or if it's the spoiler that we had an issue with), we will post a spoiler warning (see example below) using the help of the lovely River Song. Of course, the spoiler warning also applies to stand alone books as well.
Another thing you can expect with our reviews on trilogies and series is an overall review. Of course, this can only apply to to a series/trilogy we have finished reading. Please, be aware that if the series is one that is continuing without a final book in mind (IE Anita Blake), it will never have an overall review. Also, an overall review will not be given until the final book of the series is read and reviewed. So if there is one more future book to be released, that book would have to be read before we release an overall series/trilogy review.
Spoiler ExampleText of review written here. Blah blah blah blah blah. More review. Blah blah. Oh look ...
Spoilers written here.
End Spoilers
More review if needed.
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