When author Alice Hoffman read Roberta Silman’s review of her novel The Story Sisters, the author was not pleased. The review wasn’t stellar but certainly it wasn’t crushing. Hoffman, however, chose to respond in less than gracious fashion.
She tweeted nasty comments about Silman and the Boston Globe, and published Silman’s e-mail and phone number. Apparently that last action was meant as a call to arms: Hoffman fans of the world, unite! Tell off this critic!
Having been a Hoffman fan for many years, I do not feel a sense of unity with any other fan who might have chosen to answer that call before the author withdrew the tweets and issued a tepid apologetic statement.
I’m more inclined to be less inclined to read any future Hoffman books. Had she played the proverbial wet duck, she would be a much more sympathetic figure. Instead, she comes off as a hothouse flower.
There’s a danger in using technology as reprisal. Sometimes it backfires. Anyone who’s ever made a drunken phone call to an ex in the middle of the night knows how it works. Technology used in the heat of the moment equals regret, regret, regret.
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