Earlier this year, Amazon inadvertently outed a number of authors who’d posted glowing “customer reviews” of their own books, or their friends’ books. Now the online bookselling giant’s reviews section is in the news again; horror author Anne Rice has posted a lengthy rant in rebuttal to several negative assessments of her latest book, Blood Canticle.

In a very long posting free of paragraph breaks, Rice lambastes her critics’ “hateful and ugly responses” and “stupid arrogant assumptions.” She also offers to refund money, directing unsatisfied readers to return their copies of Blood Canticle directly to her and even supplying her home address.

And as Judy Stoffman in the Toronto Star drily sums up: “Rice praises herself for the effort she puts into polishing her prose and reveals that she refuses to be edited.”

Rice’s posting has of course inspired further, ah, dialogue on the Amazon.com site. Writes one recent customer reviewer: “Anne, for someone who does not need an editor, you need to understand the very basic rules of netiquette and page breaks. Your writings here were a disaster, and I daresay most of your books, up to and including this one are also a disaster.”

Related links:
Toronto Star piece on Anne Rice’s Amazon posting
Amazon.com’s Blood Canticle page