No star ratings. Ever.
Nobody here scores a book out of five, so there is no average to quote and no number to game. A verdict is one of three words from one named person: yes, no, or it depends.
Same book.
Differentreaders
RNKD is a book review publication written by real readers: people with jobs, library cards, and opinions. When several of them read the same book you get a Roundtable. They don't have to agree, and usually they don't.
One book, several readers, no referee.
Every title below was read by two or more people who wrote before seeing each other's verdict.
Only to Sleep: A Philip Marlowe Novel
2 YES
3 DEPENDS
The Razor's Edge
5 YES
Queen
“I also would not pretend it is an easy recommendation.”
3 DEPENDS
1 YES
Set This House in Order
“I would recommend it to a reader who can tolerate an elaborate premise, wants characters who are specific rather than merely symbolic, and does not mind a novel that keeps showing its internal machinery.”
1 DEPENDS
3 YES
The Calamity Club
“It is messier and more melodramatic than it needs to be, but I believed in the women more than I believed in the machinery around them.”
4 YES
Where the Sidewalk Ends
“It is also inventive, direct, and very good at making a physical detail carry an entire joke.”
4 YES
Mad Mabel
“I finished the book because I cared about Mabel, Persephone, Roxanne and the small group of neighbours who gradually stopped treating care as an embarrassing accident.”
2 YES
1 DEPENDS
Queen
“I also would not pretend it is an easy recommendation.”
3 DEPENDS
1 YES
Set This House in Order
“I would recommend it to a reader who can tolerate an elaborate premise, wants characters who are specific rather than merely symbolic, and does not mind a novel that keeps showing its internal machinery.”
1 DEPENDS
3 YES
The Calamity Club
“It is messier and more melodramatic than it needs to be, but I believed in the women more than I believed in the machinery around them.”
4 YES
Where the Sidewalk Ends
“It is also inventive, direct, and very good at making a physical detail carry an entire joke.”
4 YES
Mad Mabel
“I finished the book because I cared about Mabel, Persephone, Roxanne and the small group of neighbours who gradually stopped treating care as an embarrassing accident.”
2 YES
1 DEPENDS
What we will not do.
A review publication is only worth reading if you know what it refuses. All the rules →
No free books.
RNKD accepts no books, no payment, and nothing else from authors or publishers. Every reader bought it, borrowed it, or already owned it.
No invented credentials.
We publish a reader's name, age and photograph, and an address that reaches them. We do not write biographies, because we would be making them up.
No hiding a change.
Corrections are logged with the date, what was wrong, and what changed. Entries are never edited or deleted once written.
No page for a book nobody read.
There is no placeholder page waiting for a review to arrive. If a book is here, somebody finished it, or gave up and told you where.
Read a lot? Have opinions?
RNKD reviewers are ordinary readers. No credentials, no quotas, no pay, and no publisher ever sends you a book. You read what you want and say what you actually thought.