Amazon.com have added a system of drop-down menus for reviewers to use. This will be very handy for all those people who have read a book and gone to Amazon with the express intention of leaving a review, only to find themselves unable to think of any words.

There’s a summary here along with a useful graphic of the various menus:

I’m pretty sure it could use a few more options. (You know, like how there may be other metrics to judge plot than ‘surprise!’, and how we distinguish that simple topic ‘writing’ in a slightly more nuanced way than okay vs good.) So, all-round helpful person that I am, I’ve come up with a few other drop-down menus Amazon could add, in order to bring us all to a real, close, yet fully multiple-choice understanding of every book ever written. I think this should cover it nicely.

What did this book make you feel?

• Joy
• Mild to severe discomfort
• Wistful yearning
• Sexual desire for a billionaire
• Seething hatred of one or more characters / the author
• Anomie
• Weltzschmertz

Why do you think the author wrote this book?

• To bring joy to humanity
• Over-confidence
• Couldn’t afford therapy
• Demonic possession

Does this book include krakens?

• No cephalopods, sea monsters or Lovecraftian beasts whatsoever
• Some tentacular activity
• HORROR IN THE DEEP

If this book was an animal what would it be?

• Cute puppy
• Fluffy kitten
• Dragonfly, fragile yet iridescent in its beauty
• Filthy lumbering hog
• Kraken

What is this book worth to you?

• Toenail clippings (discarded)
• 1-3 hours of my time
• Firstborn child
• Later-born but secretly preferred child

How will the author respond to a bad review, in your opinion?

• Obliviousness
• Unconvincing gratitude
• Flounce
• Social media meltdown (two or more platforms)

What book should the author have written instead?

• Her last one, over and over again, forever
• This one, but with a different hero and maybe a different plot
• One with pictures of cats
• A much shorter one

What is your favourite colour? [This question is compulsory.]

• Puce
• Taupe
• Madder
• Gamboge

I look forward to seeing these enhancements to the multiple-choice reviewing experience, and welcome further suggestions in the comments.

_________________________________

KJ Charles is

• a freelance editor
• a romance author
• inclined to sarcasm
  
• going on holiday
  

 I’ll be back in mid April, see you then-ish. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. And feel free to swoon at the cover for A Fashionable Indulgence! (Loveswept, August, since you ask.)