There are so many ways to rate books that it can be confusing for readers who are trying to determine if the book is right for them. Everyone’s perspective and opinions vary so much that it makes sense we don’t all rate things the same way. Many readers use rating systems that make sense to them, whether that’s rating out of 5 stars, rating on a scale from 1-10, or even giving a simple thumbs up/thumbs down.
To help simplify things for you guys, we created a simple rating system guide that we use when rating a book based on its spice level and how much we enjoyed it. So let’s dive right in, shall we?
Star Rating
Personally, we find some of the rating systems to be very confusing. For example, when readers rate a book out of 5 stars, but use decimals. If that system works for you, that’s great. We just don’t understand how a book can be a 3.7 out of 5 stars. Where does that 0.7 come from and what affects it? If any of you use this system, please let us know because we’re truly curious!
Alright, so let’s break down our rating system, shall we?
⭐ = DNF. Couldn’t get into it.
For those that may not yet know, DNF stands for “Did Not Finish”. These are the books that you stop reading and give up on for whatever reason. Using 1 star for this rating is fairly new for us, as we previously did not rate DNF books at all – we just stopped reading them and moved on. However, we’ve come to realize that when we do that, we aren’t giving any feedback for others.
Giving a 1-star rating and some input as to why we couldn’t/ didn’t want to finish a book will offer some insight for other potential readers. This gives them the opportunity to decide if a book may or may not be an enjoyable read for them.
Side note – We’ve had so many conversations with other readers who feel they cannot just DNF a book. That’s totally fine if you’re one of those readers. For us, we just feel that life is too short and there are too many books out there. If we don’t enjoy one, we don’t force ourselves to finish it.
⭐⭐ = I finished the book, but it was a struggle to get through.
2-star ratings are reserved for the books that we push through and finish, even if we don’t particularly enjoy them. Maybe the writing wasn’t our favorite, but the plot had great potential, so we wanted to see how the story ended. Or maybe when we realized we didn’t enjoy the book enough to continue, we only had a couple chapters left and felt it would be silly to stop. Whatever the reason, these are the books that are nearly DNFs for us, but we end up finishing them anyway.
⭐⭐⭐ = A decent book. Nothing spectacular, but not bad either.
These books are perfectly good books. We didn’t dislike them, but we didn’t love them either. We can appreciate that the story was well written or the plot was enjoyable, but it just wasn’t the best read for us personally. Some readers feel 3 stars aren’t a good rating, but we feel differently. If a book is given 3 stars or more, we tend to feel it’s likely a book worth trying to read.
⭐⭐⭐⭐ = A great book that I’d recommend to others. Very enjoyable. Just missing that extra something.
4-star books are great books. These are the ones that we thoroughly enjoyed reading and will recommend to others. Typically, our 4-star reads have wonderful writing, a great plot, interesting characters, and maybe some fun twists. There are so many aspects to a story that can contribute to a 4-star rating.
So you may ask, with how highly we think of the book, why only 4 stars? Well that’s where the personal opinion truly makes an impact on this rating system. While we love our 4-star reads, it’s just missing that extra “something” that makes it a top tier book for us. It’s not always something we can put into words or explain, so take that into account when we give this rating. The same book may be a 5-star read for you!
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ = I loved it, keep thinking about it, want to own in multiple formats, and will likely re-read at some point.
These are THE books. Our absolute favorites. The ones we will compare other books to and make us want to dive into everything else the author has ever written. These books are ones that we’ll likely purchase in multiple formats, just so we can re-read or listen to them when we’re in a slump or we’re missing the characters/ world.
Another fun part of this rating system is that some of our 5-star reads don’t start out that way for us. There have been times when we rated a book 4 stars, but after a few weeks or months, we realize that the story or characters stuck with us. Books that we continuously think about or that our thoughts keep circling back to often become a 5-star read. We feel that despite the initial rating, if a book is able to stick with us like that, it was special in way other books weren’t, therefore bumping it up to 5-stars.
Spice Rating
Now it’s time for the spice rating. For some people, the spice is an important part of the reading experience. For us, we don’t particularly care if there’s spice or not. What matters most to us is the plot and writing. We can read just about anything, as long as it’s well done.
And with that, let’s break down the spice rating system we use!
🌶️= Fade-to-black/ Closed door; on-page kissing only
Some people will disagree that kissing/closed door scenes are not, in fact, “spice” at all. While we understand that, we ultimately feel that just because it’s not spicy for us as readers, doesn’t mean it’s the same for others. Some readers want books with absolutely no kissing or sexual tension at all, so offering a 1 chili rating is, in our opinion, a way to show that there’s something in the book, even if very little.
🌶️🌶️ = 1-2 scenes in the book; more tension than anything
This rating is for those books that offer a lot of sexual tension, but very little descriptive, smutty scenes. If anything, there may be 2 or less actual scenes that include smutty situations. For readers that don’t mind a little spice, but want to focus on the story and character development/ relationships, this is the spice level for you.
🌶️🌶️🌶️ = 3 or more scenes; detailed descriptions
A 3-chili rating is where things start getting more intense. There are 3 or more smutty scenes, often with a lot of explicit or descriptive details. There will still be more focus on the plot than the smut, but likely a lot of tension and intimate scenes.
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ = Very detailed/ explicit; frequent scenes; sometimes includes triggering content
Think 50% plot, 50% smut. You can enjoy the story still, but expect a lot of frequent sexual encounters/ scenes. These scenes may also include some content that can be triggering for others, such as specific kinks. For these books, you’ll want to check your trigger warnings prior to reading, just to be safe.
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ = Smut is the focus; little to no plot; lot of potentially triggering content
These are the stories that are driven by smut and smut alone. There could be an actual story there, but the plot is not the main focus. These books likely include a lot of triggering content due to intense sexual situations and/or kinks. The trigger warning at the beginning of the book is likely very lengthy – be sure to check that out prior to reading a book.
Everyone is Different (and we love that!)
The above guides are ours – created and decided based on our thoughts and opinions. If you choose to rate based on a different system, that’s totally cool. We would love to hear how you do it, though, because we’re always happy to tweak our system if we feel it’s something that would be an improvement or provide additional clarity for you guys.
So whether you agree or disagree with our system, we would love to hear your opinions! Bonus points if you have a unique way you rate your reads. 😉
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