A Former Paid Reviewer Shares:

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PG received the following from an individual who he won’t identify. PG has removed one sentence that might allow someone to identify the sender, but the remainder of the message is as PG received it:

I can address some of the questions you posted about reviewing for Kirkus and PW.

I have freelance-reviewed for years through various organizations, including Kirkus Indie and PW’s equivalent. For these plus Chanticleer Reviews and Dark Diva/Readers Roundtable all titles were indie published.

. . . .

Pay has ranged from $0 to $75 per review. Kirkus and PW were $25-50 at the time I wrote for them; Chanticleer started at $50 then raised to $75/per after three reviews that passed muster. NYJB has never paid, but by far has been the most satisfying opportunity. I consider my pay from them to be the excellent books that have come to me for free, whether they be advance reader copies or beautiful finished hardcovers.

In all instances there’s been someone at the organization to edit and approve my review. All except NYJB edited my reviews heavily; NYJB barely changes a comma. All but NYJB have had strict guidelines for length, format, and content. But all have been firm about us writing honest reviews, and handling negative aspects of a title tactfully. Absolutely no nastiness allowed.

I’ve never had a contract with any review orgnization, just an agreement reached via email conversations, which basically amounted to my agreeing to their procedures.

Since there’s only ever been one person between me and the organization (the review editor, who may or may not have been staff vs. freelance), I assume the bulk of what Kirkus, PW, and Chanticleer charge authors goes to the organization, presumably as profit after they pay their reviewer and review editor. I have no idea what the editor receives.

A personal note: I agree with 99% of your posted commentary about traditional vs. self/indie publishing regarding the latter being a better deal for authors. I must say, though, that the trad-pub books I’ve had available for review have been orders of magnitude better than the indies. Yes, there have been good ones, but to date, in general, on the reviewer end, through the channels I’ve experienced, indie books remain subpar to the ones that go through the gatekeeping and corporate production process.

I would go so far as to say it’s an inverse proportion, i.e., 1 or 2 out of 10 indies are worth reading and reviewing, whereas 8 or 9 out of 10 trad-pubs are worth it.

As an author myself, I’ve abandoned traditional publishing. But as a reader, I prefer its products. Not sure what that means beyond affirmation that the publishing world is changing!