Book Review and Rating Scale Explained: Mood Lit Lounge

✨ Curious about how and why we process book reviews on Mood Lit Lounge? This post breaks down our literary breakdowns, star system, and spicy scale so you can easily find your next TBR add! ✨

Hey there Lit Lovers! We, like so many other book influencers and bloggers, have our own unique book review system that we use to help you decide if our recommendation for your next read is for you. In each review that we provide, there are two different sections that we think are essential for you to determine if this is the book for you: “Lit Breakdown” and “Book Rating”. Let’s get into it!

✨Mood Lit Lounge: Literary (Lit) Breakdown✨

Our Lit Breakdown has all the details you may or may not think about, but ones we want to provide to help you decide initially if this is even the right book for you. Maybe it’s not your genre. Maybe there is a trigger warning that would negatively affect you. Maybe you enjoy closed-door romances and want to know where the steamy scenes are so you can skip them. Whatever you choose, our Lit Breakdown goes a little something like this:

Type of book – Is this a standalone, a standalone with an interconnected series, a duology, a trilogy, or more. Sometimes you just don’t always feel like making a commitment, especially if it’s a larger series (looking at you Zodiac Academy). It’s nice to know what you’re heading into which leads us to…

Finished Series – There are some people who feel comfortable waiting for new releases in an unfinished series but readers like our Mood Lit Mastermind Carlie absolutely HATE diving into books that are not complete. It’s important to us that you know where the series stands so you can make an informed decision for your reader brain.

Reading Method – This describes the method we used to read the book which helps differentiate if the review is for an audio book review or a kindle/physical book. We try to remind you in other parts of the review but when in doubt, this section will always let you know.

Genre/Trope – This lets you know up front what type of book you’re getting yourself into.

Trigger Warnings – Same as #4. Keep in mind that we do not provide a comprehensive list of trigger warnings and it is STRONGLY ENCOURAGED that you check the authors website for more details.

Age Rating – Want to see if this book is suitable to read with others based on the ages of the characters? We let you know if we consider this book Adult (A 22+), New Adult (NA 18-21), or Young Adult (YA 13+).

Mood – This one is INCREDIBLY important to us here at Mood Lit Lounge – it describes our very essence of reading. Mood can be so influential to us in what type of book we pick next so we always want to let you know the vibes it gives off so you can see if you’re ready for that type of read.

Season – Just as important for the mood readers! Mood Lit Mastermind Abby swears by this – she cannot read a book that isn’t in the current season. Not every reader feels this is a requirement to begin a new book, but for the readers it matters to, we are happy to oblige.

Closed Door Chapters – While we love spice with the things we read, not everyone does and that’s ok. We do our best to alert you to which chapters might have that content.

POVs – Ever read a book that had so many POV’s that you had a hard time keeping up? (Cough cough Six of Crows cough cough). Or read a book that you wish had a male and female POV? Now you’ll know!

KU Friendly – For so many readers this is a must requirement (us included) so if you can save moneys with your membership we are so here for that.

Audiobook Available – Not only do we let you know if there is an audiobook available, we let you know how long it is. Have you seen those monsters (From Blood and Ash) who have around 28 hours?! You can see if you’ve got the mental bandwidth to handle that sort of headphone commitment. We also like to see if it’s single, dual, or full cast narration.

✨Mood Lit Lounge Book Review Star Rating System ✨

Now that you have some book background, we move onto what most people associate with a true book review rating: the stars. We take a lot into consideration when giving stars and we NEVER give a book review rating that we did not finish (DNF). Our star ratings are as follows:

⭐ – I wanted to DNF this book but I didn’t; instead I rage read the entire thing so I could just get it over with and am upset with myself that I kept the madness going. Sometimes this can be in the way of the writing style, the type of POV (first, second, third, etc), or things that the main characters say or do that just drives me insane.

⭐⭐ – Book slump danger zone! This was also likely rage read with the caveat of a character I stayed in the fight for. This means my only sole mission is to finish it so I could find out what happened to them. There were also probably other elements that I enjoyed but just not enough to warrant the unhappiness I had with the rest of the book. It was painful and took much longer than usual to finish.

⭐⭐⭐- I really enjoyed this book! It was entertaining and a fast read that I couldn’t put down. It made me laugh or cry or feel a strong emotional connection of some sort. It isn’t life-changing, or even one I might re-read again, but if an opportunity arose for me to give out a recommendation for it, I absolutely would.

⭐⭐⭐⭐ – OMG I loved this book! I’m going to be telling everyone about it immediately so they can read it and fangirl/fanboy/fan whatever with me. We are going to share quotes and make inside jokes and I’m going to make all the Tiktoks and Booksta posts because I will be low-key obsessed. I will absolutely reread these. I’m also buying special editions and merch because I loved it so much.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐- All of the things from a four-star review but also the feeling that this book has literally changed my life and I will forever think about them. They will be my comfort books and my all-time favorites from now until I die. I usually reread them every year. It’s not often that a full 5 stars are given out.

✨Mood Lit Lounge Spicy Rating System ✨

And lastly, we have the spicy book rating (applicable for Romance books only – and yes we don’t always read romance, just you know, a lot of time.) We keep these ratings in the “Book Rating” section for all blog posts. It’s hard to use a green bell pepper emoji, so for those books that are either closed door romances or books that don’t have any spicy parts, we just leave that blank. If, however, the book leads into chili pepper territory then this is how we rate those:

❤️‍🔥 – First/Second base. There is more than just a make-out session going on and we are usually groping and or getting handsy with our love interests; often. We a lot of times will swing on over to second, and even occasionally go all the way. You find this often with the teasing slow burns (if we are even lucky enough to get that.) The descriptions within the books aren’t mentioned in specific detail but will let you know what is happening.

❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥- Second/Third base. We are definitely hitting second base often, as well as third. The descriptions are getting a bit more graphic, and we are having some pretty decent dirty talk and mention of kinks going on. We still have a pretty good plot to steamy romance scenario.

❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥 – All the bases. We are in full on smut category now. We have dirty talk, kinks, and more. It’s delightfully spicy and a great plot.

❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥- We are basically banging. A lot. We have minimal plot. It’s downright filthy.

❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥 – You are nothing but pure erotica with zero plot whatsoever except that people are getting laid literally every other chapter or constantly. This is top tier level “I must drop everything now and go find my significant other RIGHT FREAKING NOW.”

Because we are mindful that authors are real people with real emotions, we try to be kind whenever we truly didn’t enjoy a book. Not just because that’s being a good human, but also just because we didn’t love it doesn’t mean you won’t! If you find that your book review ratings are similar to ours for the books you’re reading then we are probably a safe bet for you – but even we don’t give the same books the same ratings internally (which is when we will post a dual battle review). Remember, it’s whatever the book does to bring YOU dear Lit Lover enjoyment. We’re just giving our humble Mood Lit musings here.

Is how you rate your book reviews similar to how we do ours? Let us know in the comments!

Abby

✨Mood Lit Mastermind✨

Abby is an ADHD moody reader book lover who has had a love of reading for as long as she can remember! When not making podcast episodes or writing for the blog, you can find her snuggling with Pan, baking something unhealthy, or hiding with her kindle.