The bashful book reviewer's dilemma

I have very mixed feelings when someone asks me about the work of reviewing books. The more I meditate on the experience the more they get mixed. On the one hand it is a great pleasure to read a new book and to comment on it. It is an invitation to be analytical and judge the book, you'll be thinking. And so it is, in principle!

In reality it is a work that has an aftermath. Just like any kind of original writing, if your review is anything but boringly bland and supportive of the writing You will make enemies. And how!
Now what would you do if the book you were given had typos all over the place? You cant very well go around declaring that the author has asserted an artistic license on can you?

And reviewers are very conscious that what they say will be read by the author and publisher's faculty but even if the whole world is up in arms you cannot gloss over it when there are logical blunders, errors in organizing the text and even in dates - mind you I am not referring to the disputed ones, just factual slip ups.

I have written many book reviews and it is a beastly task one has on one's hands. Sometimes the book reviews are not published - it is at the discretion of the editor. Even during my short stint as book reviewer, I have collected one story to narrate. Someone who was friends with me for a long time refused to speak with me for long and during one chance conversation when we met, the person says, ' but you give such good reviews for big publishers, it's only with the smaller ones that you take off.'

Does this person know of how many reviews I wrote were rejected? Sometimes those of books printed by big publishers got rejected too. Do you know what a pain it is to read a boring book diligently and to write a review and then to see it being rejected. No!

The book reviewer's job is many times unenviable and a thankless one and I would gladly relinquish it for some other more interesting position of writer. In fact I am definitely being given a rest with respect to book reviewing and though I try, I can't just say it was fun while it lasted.