[This is embarrassing.  The post is supposed to be amusing.  Some readers have sent my notes about how sorry they are that someone gave me a bad review.  Not so!  I was attempting to write humor.  Please laugh.]

“This book does not disappoint.”    I read lots of reviews at on-line books stores.  Every time I see “Does not disappoint,” I wonder if there is less enthusiastic praise than that.  Yes, there are many worse reviews.  “This book made me throw up” is one I hope never to see.   Another is, “I hated this book so much I ground it up, made it into hamburgers, and poisoned my neighbors’ barking dog with it.”

But if you want to recommend a book, please find a way to express your  view in words that sound like a compliment.  When I read the “does-not-disappoint” comment on a review site, it brings to mind images and scenarios like these:

“When my table wobbled, I shoved this book under a leg.  It did not disappoint.”

“I used this book to kill an ant and it did not disappoint.”

“A friend recommended this book to cure my insomnia.  It did not disappoint.”

I mean, really, is this what you, as a reader, mean to suggest?   “It does not disappoint” is like using the old Texas saying “Reading this book was better than a poke in the eye.”  Not high praise.

Do you ever post a review?  Have you read any reviews that you thought were really good or bad?