An ARC is an Advance Review Copy of a book. Generally, a lot of reviews on a book help it get noticed on Amazon and let other potential buyers know that others have already read and enjoyed it – thus helping sales as well. Sometimes these early reviews also help to generate excitement and buzz about their upcoming work, especially when the reviews start coming in positively, or if they start getting picked up or posted to different blogs or websites.

The earlier a book has reviews, the sooner this positive effect can begin. To achieve this, an author may choose to send out free, advance copies of their newest book to fans or interested readers in the hope that those readers will then leave honest reviews of the book when it goes live. In some cases, they may even send out these copies after the book is already for sale.

Hidden Gems Books (HG) sends out a variety of new novels every day of the year, from the thousands of authors that use our service. With so much variety, every reader will eventually see something that interests them, but at the same time, they will not be interested in (or have time to read) all the ARC offerings. For that reason, each of our books is opt-in, and because of our large pool of ARC readers, there are some occasions where we can only select a subset of those that are interested.

Here’s how the process generally works:

1. Author Contacts HG About Their Book

   An author looking for reviews on their novel contacts us and provides us with the details of their book (cover, blurb, genres/categories, etc), how many reviewers they want us to send the book to, and when they want it to go out.

2. Book Details Sent to Readers

   A couple days before the scheduled date, the details of each book will be available for sign up on the New ARCs Available tab of your dashboard, and an email with the covers and genres will be sent as a notification and reminder to check what is new. Clicking any of the covers in that email will take you directly to that tab on your dashboard so you can view all the details and click to sign up if the book interests you.  Note that while the email sent will include ALL books available that day, your dashboard will only show you the books of the genres you are interested in – although you can change those genres at any point to see more or less books.

   We ask that readers ONLY sign up for books that look interesting to them, and that they think they will enjoy and have the time to read and review in a reasonable amount of time. Don’t worry about missing out on an offer as there are always plenty more to come, but also feel free to sign up for more than one book a day in order to improve your chances of being selected.

3. Book Files Available to Selected Readers Only

   On the scheduled date of the ARC, selected readers will be able to download the book files from links on either their dashboard or an email that is sent to notify them that they have been chosen.  Note that you are still responsible to read the book even if you missed the email (or if it got lost to spam/junk/promo folders) so it is helpful to bookmark your dashboard and get in the habit of checking it regularly, as it is a far more reliable source of the books available and that have been sent.

   The readers that are selected are taken from those that sign up, but sometimes you may not get selected for every book you ask for, as it depends on a variety of factors.

4. Selected Readers Must Fill Out Reader Form

   As soon as you are selected as a reader for one of the books you signed up for, the book will be listed on the Books You’re Reading tab of your dashboard, and from there you’ll be able to also notify us of when your review is live on Amazon or your reason for not reviewing, if you chose to not review that particular book.

   Note that you must complete either of those fields (review or reason for not reviewing) on your reader form for each book we send, as that is one of the requirements for remaining in the HG ARC program and continuing to get new books.  But keep in mind that it’s okay if it takes you longer than the books review date to finish it – those dates are guidelines that the author hopes you’ll aim for but it’s always better to get it in later than that than not at all. Just fill out the form whenever you’re done, and only use the reason for not reviewing field if you don’t plan to review the book at all.

   Periodic reminder emails and notifications will be sent when you have reader forms that are not complete past their review dates. These reminders are automated, so don’t take them personally, just get them done when you can.  And ONLY use the reason for not reviewing field if you are not planning to review a book at all. If you do plan to review it, just leave it blank until you’ve done so.

   Note that there is also a place to leave an optional private comment to the author about the book, if you wish – but it only shows up after you have filled out one of those other two fields.

If you love to read books, love to share your opinion on Amazon about those books by leaving a review*, and are willing to fill out our extremely short and quick reader form for each book we send you, then this is the program for you.

Here are the main points to getting free books:

• Only sign up for books that interest you and that you will have time to read in a reasonable amount of time (we provide a review date to aim for, but it’s okay if it takes you longer – just try not to sign up for too many books that you fall far behind)
• Continue to leave honest, fair and useful reviews on Amazon** for those books as often as possible
• Always fill out the reader form for each book we send – whether it is with your review link or the reason you decided not to review it***

Contact us whenever you have problems with any of the above

*Although Hidden Gems never charges our ARC readers anything for the books we send, Amazon does have a policy that anyone leaving a review must have spent at least $50 on their site in the past 12 months. This Amazon rule is completely outside our control, so any issues you have with it should be taken up with Amazon directly. HG ARC Readers must be able to leave reviews on Amazon, as that is where our authors are looking for their reviews to be posted.

**Currently we are only accepting Amazon reviews, but in the near future we will be accepting reviews on other sites for the authors that are interested in those. If you can review elsewhere, make sure to fill out your profile info for each site so that you can start getting those book offers as soon as that option is available.

***Filling our your reader form is a requirement of the program and is used to judge your continuing participation. In fairness to both other readers and our authors, Hidden Gems reserves the right to remove readers/reviewers from the program (or limit the number of books we send them) that we feel (in our sole judgement) seem to no longer have the time or the interest in continuing.

Each morning, an email with the covers and genres of the day’s new ARC books will arrive in your inbox. If you click any of the covers, you’ll be brought right to your dashboard where you can view the full details and sign up for any of the books you are interested in reading and review. (Note that the email will show ALL the books available, but your dashboard will filter specifically to only show your genres of interest, which you can edit at any time.)*

Each book is only looking for a limited number of readers, so if more readers sign up it is possible that some may not get chosen.  That’s why we ask, in fairness to other readers and the author, that you read all the book details carefully and ONLY click on the Sign Up button for the books that interest you and that you have time to read in a reasonable amount of time.

We do our best to make sure everyone gets a chance to read often, provided those readers are in good standing with us (actively participating, regularly filling out their forms, etc), so don’t get discouraged if you aren’t chosen for each book you request. Just keep signing up. The more consistent you are with filling out your reader forms, the more likely you’ll be chosen for a future book. And if multiple books interest you, you’re free to sign up for as many as you want that day which will also increase your chances of you getting one.

A couple of days after the sign-up period begins, an email will go out to the selected readers for that book with a link to download the book in a couple of formats. If you are unsure what to do with those files, click here. Usually this email will go out around 9am EST, although there are occasional delays that make it get sent out later in the day. You can also check your dashboard, because any books you are selected for (but haven’t filled out your reader form for) will always be listed on the Books You’re Reading tab and you can get the files from there as well.

On the review date, readers who haven’t yet completed the reader form for that book will get an email reminding them that they have been selected but have not yet filled out the reader form. Other reminders may come later as well, but once your reader form is filled out with either your review link or reason for not reviewing, the reminders for that book will stop.

Remember that the review date is more of a date that the author is hoping you’ll aim for, but if you aren’t done by that date don’t abandon the book – please finish it as soon as you can and then fill the form out then.  It’s ALWAYS better late than never and those reminders are automated so don’t take them personally.

Feel free to participate in as many or as few ARC reviews as you have time and interest for, but remember:

IT IS VITAL THAT YOU NOT MISS FILLING OUT YOUR READER FORMS (REASON FOR NOT REVIEWING OR REVIEW LINK) FOR EACH BOOK WE SEND – READERS THAT REPEATEDLY FAIL TO FILL OUT THIS FORM WILL BE CONSIDERED TO BE TOO BUSY TO CONTINUE WITH HIDDEN GEMS, AND MAY BE REMOVED FROM THE ARC PROGRAM WITHOUT WARNING.

And that’s about all you need to know about participating and getting a steady stream of free books to review.

And of course, you can always change your settings or preferences, or even leave the program entirely, at any time.  But we hope you remain reading and reviewing with us for as long as possible.

*As sign-ups for each book are done via the dashboard, you can turn off the daily new ARC email that comes each morning however we do not recommend it. Without that email it would be very easy to forget to regularly check the new books that come available each morning, and risk missing out on something you’d be interested in.

For enhanced security/privacy and to allow us to do more with your dashboard, all ARC readers now must login to use the system.

In order to make it easy and not break your flow of reading books, when you first sign up for the Hidden Gems ARC program you will be automatically logged in (after you verify your email) and you should stay logged in unless you explicitly log out.  Just click on the Dashboard link at the top right of our website to get started!

For enhanced security and easier log in/out, users can create a more standard password at any time which we highly recommend.

However, there are still some login issues that users may experience depending on the type of login method they use, so please see the list below to identify your issue and the solution.

I haven’t set a password and want to login again

If you are still using the unique link login that you were assigned originally and you have logged out of your dashboard, then you need to click that link to log back in. The link can be found in the original welcome email we sent you, or if you requested a new one since then, in the email that was sent with the new link.

If you don’t have any old emails with your links, you can go to the login page of the website and add your email to the Username or Email Address box, and then click the “Request Unique Link Login” button.  Once you do that, you will be sent an email with a new unique login you can click to access your dashboard.  Remember that if you logout though, you will need to use that link to login again so do not delete the email. Or even better, click the Lost/Create Password link instead and create a password that you will remember and can use to login in the future instead of the links. Passwords are more secure, so we recommend everyone create one when possible.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Whenever you generate a new unique link (as described above) it invalidates your previous links so make sure to only use the latest link we sent you. And only click the button once, otherwise you will have 2 new ones generated and it may be confusing about which one to use.

I created a password but I can’t remember it

Once you’ve created a password your old unique link URLs can no longer be used, so you must remember the password that you set. It is case sensitive, so you have to enter it exactly as you did when you first set it.

If you cannot remember it, you can reset it by clicking the Lost/Create Password link (see screenshot above) from the login page. You will then be prompted to enter your email address and click the “Get New Password” button.

Make sure to only click this button only ONCE, as each time you do it will send an email to you with a reset password link and each time it generates that link, it invalidates the old one.  So if you click it multiple times, you will get more than one email and link and not know which one to use.

Click the link to reset your password and you will be taken to a screen that lets you add a new password. By default, a random strong password will be generated for you that you can use, however if you wish to create your own, just click into the “New password” field and replace the password that is there. You can also click the “Generate Password” button to create a new strong password.

The strength of your password will be displayed under the “New password” field. If your password is considered weak/very weak (i.e. easy for someone to guess) but you still want to use it, you must click the “Confirm use of weak password” checkbox first before you will be able to save your new password.  It is recommended you use a variety of symbols, letters and numbers to create a strong password, and not reuse a password you use on other websites.

Once you are happy with your password, click the “Save Password” button and make sure to remember what you’ve chosen and that passwords are case sensitive.  You can now login with your new password.

The password reset link doesn’t work

If you follow the steps above to reset your email, but when you click the link in your email you get a message that the link is invalid, it is usually because you have requested the link more than once and you are trying to use one of the links that has since been invalidated by a later request.  Note that the emails with these links can sometimes get delayed, although they should usually arrive within a few minutes.   If there is a delay and you click it twice (or more), often you’ll get the first email before you get the second one and because you have requested the second one, the first link is now invalid.

Please wait at least 30 minutes for the email to come before giving up and trying it again. Usually it will come well before that. If not, check your spam or junk folders, or Gmails promo tab.  They could be getting lost.

The website says that I’m blocked

If you attempt to login with the wrong password too many times, the website will determine that you may be a hacker and thus lock you out of the site temporarily. If you find that you are blocked or locked out, you can either wait for 24 hours until the block is lifted automatically, or send us an email and we can unblock you sooner.

To avoid this, make sure to be careful about entering your password and consider saving it with your browser username and password save capability.

Still having login issues?

If you are experiencing a different issue with login, or the solutions above don’t work, please contact us.

For each book that we send you, you’re required to fill out a reader form with either your Amazon review link or your reason for not reviewing.  As many readers have issues finding their reviews or (depending on device being used) copy and pasting the links into our form, we made the process as easy as possible by finding them for you, as soon as you let us know that they’re ready.

In order to do that, though, we first need your publicly available Amazon profile link.

If your reader form has a big orange button that says “Find Your Review Automatically” then we already have your profile link, so you just need to make sure to click that button whenever you’ve written your Amazon review AND your review has been approved and posted by Amazon (which can sometimes take days – if that happens, just wait it out, but you can still read and review other books in the meantime).

However, for new reviewers that haven’t yet logged a review with us, instead of the button you’ll see a link that says “Enter your Amazon profile link“.

If you are seeing that link, it means we don’t yet have your publicly available Amazon profile link/url so we need you to provide it.

What is my Amazon public profile?

Whenever you look at a review for a product on Amazon, you see the Amazon username of the person that left the review.

In the example above, the Amazon profile name is “Avid Reader” (we’ve boxed it in red to make it obvious – but on Amazon there is no red box.)

Anyone viewing a review could then click on the profile name of the user that wrote it, and would then be taken to the public profile page of that user. From there, they can view all of the reviews that user has left. That public profile really only shows your review info and username info, which is why Amazon allows anyone to view it (mainly to provide context regarding your reviews by showing how you’ve reviewed other things).

Why does Hidden Gems want it?

As your profile is tied to your reviews, we (like anyone else) can use your profile to find your reviews for the books we’ve sent you. So whenever you leave a review and let us know by clicking the “Find Your Review Automatically” button, we know to go and look for it. We do this simply as a way to verify that you have reviewed the correct book that you said you reviewed. However, if you don’t click the button, or if you use the “I’m unable to Review This Book” button instead, we won’t look for it at all.

The other thing that having your profile allows us to do is to customize the Amazon book review url to take you directly to your country specific Amazon site. So when you’re ready to write your review, if you click the Amazon link from your dashboard and your profile is on Amazon.ca or Amazon.co.uk, for example, then those links will take you to those Amazon sites instead of Amazon.com.

Submitting Your Amazon Profile for the first time

As we’ve explained, we need your Amazon profile link in order to find your reviews once you’ve left them, but as your profile never changes (unless you create a new Amazon account), we only need you to send it once and if you’ve already sent us reviews, we likely already have it.

If not, there are two ways you can submit your Amazon profile.  If you’ve already been sent a book, then you can go to your Books You’re Reading tab and click “Enter your Amazon profile link“.  The other way, which works whether you have been sent a book or not, is go to the Your Profile Links tab and then click the orange “Click to add profile link” button in the AMAZON PROFILE LINK section.

Regardless of which of the two options above you followed, you’ll see the same screens to add your profile link.

The first step is to select which of the Amazon storefronts you use for leaving reviews.  As Amazon has a rule that customers must have spent at least $50 in the last 12 months in order to leave a review for a book they didn’t purchase, it is important that you select the profile of the account you met this requirement on even if you have more than 1 Amazon account.  For instance, if you live in the United States, you are probably fine to leave the default (shown above) as Amazon.com is most likely the site your profile is on.  But if you live in Canada, for example, then you would want to select “Canada – Amazon.ca” from the dropdown.

Once you’ve made your selection, click NEXT.

Next, you want to click the blue link at the top of the window, which will open your Amazon profile page.  In the above example, it is going to open Amazon.com but if you had chosen a different country in the previous step, it would point to your country specific Amazon site instead.

When you click that link, your browser should open up to your Amazon profile page (the screenshot in the window above shows what that might look like) and what we need from here is the URL, which is found in the address bar of the browser up at the top – where the big red arrow is pointing.  It would be something like “https://www.amazon.com/gp/profile/amzn1.account.AFLGHWB6KSW5REXXXX” where the ending is different for each profile.  Highlight that whole URL and copy it so that you can paste it in the next screen.

Once you’ve copied it, click NEXT.

Finally, paste the URL you copied from the previous step into the box above (the one that says “Enter Your Amazon Profile Link”.

Hit SUBMIT and then you’re all done, we now have your profile and should be able to find your reviews whenever you add them to Amazon and let us know that they’re live.

Viewing/Changing Your Amazon Profile

You can view the Amazon profile we have for you on file (which is the profile we use to look up your reviews) via the Your Profile Links tab on your dashboard. Just have a look at the link in the AMAZON PROFILE LINK section. You can even click it to go directly to that publicly available Amazon profile page.

For most people, your Amazon profile will never change but there are cases where it does – such as when you create a new Amazon account for some reason, or if you change to a different Amazon country. In those cases, you can request to change your Amazon profile in that same tab and section, by clicking the orange “Request to Change URL” button. Once we approve the request to change your URL, you’ll be able to add a new one via the steps above but until then, your current profile will remain active.

Note that if you are having problems with any of this, please contact us for help!

Your ARC reader Dashboard is your key to signing up for new ARCs, keeping track of the books you’ve been sent, downloading book files, filling out reader forms, managing your account, and much more. We highly recommend bookmarking your dashboard and visiting it daily so that you never miss a great new book.

In order to keep things organized, your dashboard is divided into tabs (in the view above, the tabs are in blue along the left side of the page but depending on the size of your screen or the device you’re using, your view may look different or the tabs may be accessed via a menu). Below is a list of each tab and a brief overview of what they are used for, with links to go to more details about each where applicable.

Dashboard (Default tab and common dashboard elements)

When you first login to Hidden Gems, you’ll see your default dashboard tab which is mainly an overview of all the important things you need to know.  You’ll see a few of the New ARCs available, some of the books you’re currently reading, important announcements, review reminders, and even a link to our most recent blog or books that may be on sale in one of your genres of interest.  Clicking on books in those small New ARCs and Books You’re Reading applets will take you directly that book in the full version of those tabs – but remember that those small versions only show a few of the selections that may be available on the full tab.

You can also view your username along the top (which will be your email address until you change it) as well as your current gem status.

New ARCs Available

The New ARCs Available tab displays a list of all of the ARCs currently open for sign up within your genres of interest.  Remember that the small version of this tab on the default dashboard tab (in the screenshot above titled “New ARCs”) is not the complete list, that applet only shows you a few of the titles so make sure to click the full tab to see the complete list of books. From the New ARCs Available tab, you can view all of the book details and sign up to be an ARC reviewer.

Books You’re Reading

The Books You’re Reading tab is where you’ll find a list of all of the books we’ve sent you that you have not yet filled out the reader form for (that is, you haven’t submitted either your review link or reason for not reviewing).  From this tab you’ll see some of the details of these books, find the links to leave your Amazon review if you haven’t already done so, let us know if your reviews are live for us to find, or provide your reason for not reviewing if you aren’t going to be reviewing, as well as leave your optional comment.  You can also get the book files directly from here, if you don’t already have them, provided that they are still available.

Completed Books

The Completed Books tab is where you can find all of the books we’ve sent where you’ve already completed your reader form.  From here, you can view the Amazon review you submitted (if you sent one in), view or edit the reason for not reviewing field if you filled that in instead, or even add a review for a book you previously left a reason for (if you eventually were able to review it after all – always better late than never!)  You can also view the comments you left, or add some if you didn’t already do so (although they are optional).

Your Profile Links

The Your Profile Links tab is where you go to add your profile links for all of the review sites that you can leave reviews on.  Currently we are only accepting Amazon reviews, but that is going to change soon so ahead of that we need to collect your profile information for each site.  Once we have enough users with profiles added and have completed our work on supporting those sites, we will start allowing non-Amazon reviews. So it is important to fill this info out ASAP if you haven’t already – especially if you are not able to leave reviews on Amazon.

Your Stats

The Your Stats tab is where you can find more details about your Gem status, how many books you’ve read, reviews you’ve left, etc.

Your Settings

The Your Settings tab is where you can setup your username, your file preferences (such as having us send the books directly to your kindle), change your password, your genre interests, and more.

Log Out

Click Log Out if you wish to log out of your dashboard, although unless you are using a public computer or sharing it with someone you don’t trust, we recommend you stay logged in.

The New ARCs Available tab is where you can view all of the ARC books currently available for sign up within your genres of interest. From this tab, you can view all the details of each book (Cover, Genre, Sub-categories, Description, etc) and then if you’re interested in reading it, you can click the “Sign Up for This Book” button next to it.

If you click it, then the button disappears and you’ll see a checkmark with the word “Requested” next to it.

You can sign up for as many books as you are interested in, and if you’re selected then you’ll get an email within a couple of days letting you know, along with providing the links to download the book files. You can also check your dashboard, as every book that you’re selected for will show up in the Books You’re Reading tab, and from there you can download the files as well. Given how unreliable emails are in terms of delivery and spam, it’s always a good idea to check your dashboard regularly to make sure you didn’t miss the message that you were selected for a book!

In fairness to the authors, be sure to look at all of the book details and read the entire description (you may need to use the vertical scrollbar next to the description text to see the entire description if it is long) before signing up for a book.

Only sign up for books that you are interested in reading, think you can at least come close to reading it by the review date, and that you think you’ll enjoy. Otherwise just skip it, another book that suits you better is sure to come along soon!

What if there are no books to sign up for?

If you don’t see any new books listed here, that means there are no new books in your genre that day.  But new books become available each day, and stay open for sign up for close to 2 days, so if you check back tomorrow or the day after, you’re sure to see something that interests you.

However, it also depends on your genres of interest. The more genres you have selected, the more books you’ll see offered.  Each day there are usually 4 or 5 new titles added, so if you aren’t seeing anything you like, consider selecting more genres that interest you.  You can do that via the Your Settings tab.

Any books that you’ve been selected for and haven’t yet filled out the reader form for will show up in the Books You’re Reading tab. This allows you to keep track of all the books you were sent, download the book files, and fill out your reader forms.

By default, all books that you haven’t completed the reader form for will show up in this list, with 10 books showing per page. You can move to the next page via the arrows at the bottom of the list.

Filtering, Sorting and Search

For those with many books in this list, you will find the ability to filter/sort your list or search for specific books useful.

To shorten the list, you can select “New” from the filter section at the top left. This will filter the list to only show you books sent recently.

Alternatively, you can select the “Ready for reviews” filter, which will show only the books that have hit or past their review dates.  As a reminder, the review dates are just dates that the author is hoping you aim for, but it is always okay to send your reviews in past those dates.

To search for a specific book, you can type the title of the book in the “Search by Title” box at the top right.

You must type at least 3 letters of the title, and any matching options will be displayed. If you click one, that book alone will be displayed in this tab.  Click the “x” in the search box to clear the search.

To sort your list, change the “Order By Review Date” dropdown to either “Oldest to newest” or “Newest to oldest”.

Review Dates

As a reminder, the review date is simply the date that the author is hoping readers will aim for, but it is fine if you take longer to read and leave a review. Always better late than never. These review dates will be displayed within the book information on this tab if the date has not yet passed.  If the review date has come, then you’ll see one of two messages (depending on how long ago the review date was in the past).

Review reminder emails will also be sent after the review date has passed, but these are automated so don’t take them personally. Just get the reviews done as soon as you can.

Book Files

If you haven’t yet downloaded the book files, you can click the “Need the book files again?” link which will then display your download options, generally either PDF or ePub.  If you click the ePub link, then the file will be sent to you based on your ePub delivery settings as specified in Your Settings.

Note: Always download the book files as soon as you can, even if you aren’t going to read the book immediately. We don’t keep the files on our system forever, and once we’ve removed them they are gone and will no longer be available. If that is the case for one of your books that was sent to you a while ago, you will not see the option to download the book files.

Leaving Your Reviews (or not reviewing)

If you haven’t yet written your review on Amazon, you can click the link to “write your review” which will take you to the Amazon product page for that book (specific to the country of the Amazon profile we have for you on file).  If that link is not available, it means that the book is not yet published but once it is, we’ll add the link.

Once you’ve written your review AND Amazon has approved and posted it, you can click the “Find Your Review Automatically” or the “I’m Unable to Review This Book” button (although that one should be used only in cases where you never plan to review the book, which is hopefully the exception and happens rarely). Click here for more details on these buttons or filling out your reader forms in general.

Any books that you have already completed the reader form for (submitted either your review link or your reason for not reviewing) will show up in the Completed Books tab. This allows you to keep track of all the books you’ve already read, view your reviews (or submit one) or reasons, and add/edit your optional author comments.

As this list can eventually become quite long, we only display 10 books per page but you can move to the next page via the arrows at the bottom of the list.

Note: You can request a complete list of books we’ve sent you in csv format, via the Your Stats tab.

Filtering, Sorting and Search

For those with many books in this list, you will find the ability to filter/sort your list or search for specific books useful.

To shorten the list, you can select “New” from the filter section at the top left. This will filter the list to only show you books sent recently.

Alternatively, you can select the “Ready for reviews” filter, which will show only the books that have hit or past their review dates.  As a reminder, the review dates are just dates that the author is hoping you aim for, but it is always okay to send your reviews in past those dates.

To search for a specific book, you can type the title of the book in the “Search by Title” box at the top right.

You must type at least 3 letters of the title, and any matching options will be displayed. If you click one, that book alone will be displayed in this tab.  Click the “x” in the search box to clear the search.

To sort your list, change the “Order By Review Date” dropdown to either “Oldest to newest” or “Newest to oldest”.

Viewing Updating Reader Form Info

If you have left a review for a book, you will see a link to view it. By clicking it, you will go directly to your review on Amazon. Review links cannot be changed once they have been submitted.

If you have left a reason for not reviewing, you will see this here.  In the event that you have since left a review that you previously left a reason for, you can click the “Left a review after all?” button to have us find your review and add it.

In either case, you’ll also be able to leave an optional comment to the author (or edit one you have previously left).

As a reminder, these comments should not contain any identifying information (email address, real name, etc) or they will removed. These comments are meant simply as a way to send a brief note to the author about something that you didn’t include in your review (thanking them for the book, noting small typos you may have seen, etc).

In order to find your reviews, we look for them on the profiles of the different websites where we capture reviews. Right now, we’re only asking for Amazon reviews but in the near future, we will be starting to capture reviews on other websites as well.  In order to get ARC offers, please fill out the profile links for each of the websites that you have an account and can leave reviews on by clicking the button within the box.

From this tab you can also request to change existing profiles and turn off your daily ARC sign up emails, if you like.

As each website is different in terms of your profiles and how you review books, what we need and how you get it differs for each site.  By clicking the button on each one, you will get a popup with steps and screenshots of what we need, but below is a quick breakdown of each as well.

Amazon Profile Links

The Amazon profile link is the URL that goes to your publicly viewable Amazon profile, where all the reviews you’ve written can be seen by anyone. The reviewer name you use also shows on this profile, but we’re looking for the actual URL that takes us to your profile, not your reviewer name here.  To add it, click the button “Click to add profile link” and then you’ll see a popup window that will take you through a few steps to help. After each step click next and at the end, click submit.

Steps for submitting Amazon profile link:

1. Select the country of your Amazon account where you can leave reviews from the dropdown (like Amazon.ca if it’s Canada, Amazon.co.uk for the UK, etc). If you’re in the USA and use Amazon.com you can just click next as that is the default selection.
2. Click link at the top of this step which should open a new page in your browser that may ask you to login to your Amazon account, and should take you to your profile page.  From here, click into the address bar and copy the URL of the page. It should look something like the link in the screenshot below.
3. The final step is where you paste the URL that you copied in the step before.  Once you click “Submit”, we’ll have your profile and we’ll be able to find your reviews whenever you write them and let us know that they’re live.

Once we have your profile, you’ll see it in this box. If you need to change your profile for some reason in the future, you can click the “Request to Change URL” button.

If you want to stop getting our daily ARC emails about new Amazon books available for review, you can click the “Stop sending Amazon ARC sign up emails” checkbox.  You can still see all the ARCs available on your dashboard and sign up for them, but you won’t be notified about the new books (the email we send with the covers and genres each morning) which means it’s easy to forget – which is why we don’t recommend you use this checkbox unless you are in the habit of regularly logging into your dashboard.

Goodreads Profile Link

If you can leave Goodreads reviews, please click the button “Click to add profile link” in the Goodreads box.  Once we start accepting Goodreads reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

Steps for submitting Goodreads profile link:

1. Login to Goodreads and select “Profile” from the menu icon at the top right.
2. You should now be on your profile page. Click the URL in the address bar and copy it.  Then paste it into the box on the popup page and click “Submit”.

You can view your profile from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

Kobo Reviewer Name

If you can leave Kobo reviews, please click the button “Click to add your reviewer name” in the Kobo box.  Once we start accepting Kobo reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

In order for us to be able to find and verify your Kobo reviews, we require you to use a single reviewer name for all your Kobo reviews (at least for the books we send you). You can use the name you already use on Kobo or a different one, however it must be unique in OUR system. That means that if someone else has already registered it as their Kobo reviewer name, you’ll have to choose another one.

You can enter this name in the box in the popup and click “Submit”.

You can view your Kobo reviewer name from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

Barnes and Noble Reviewer Name

If you can leave Barnes and Noble reviews, please click the button “Click to add your reviewer name” in the Barnes and Noble box.  Once we start accepting Barnes and Noble reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

In order for us to be able to find and verify your Barnes and Noble reviews, we require you to use a single reviewer name for all your B&N reviews (at least for the books we send you). If you already have a B&N reviewer name, we recommend you continue using that one. If you don’t, you should make sure that the name you want to use is available on B&N first. Once you are sure of your reviewer name, enter it below.

You can enter this name in the box in the popup and click “Submit”.

You can view your Barnes and Noble reviewer name from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

Bookbub Profile Link

If you can leave Bookbub reviews, please click the button “Click to add profile link” in the Bookbub box.  Once we start accepting Bookbub reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

Steps for submitting Bookbub profile link:

1. Login to Bookbub and select “My Profile” from the menu icon at the top right.
2. You should now be on your profile page. Click the URL in the address bar and copy it.  Then paste it into the box on the popup page and click “Submit”.

You can view your profile from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

Apple Books Reviewer Name

If you can leave Apple Books reviews, please click the button “Click to add your reviewer name” in the Kobo box.  Once we start accepting Kobo reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

In order for us to be able to find and verify your Apple reviews, we require you to enter the reviewer name that you use on Apple Books. Please enter that below.

You can enter this name in the box in the popup and click “Submit”.

You can view your Apple Books reviewer name from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

Google Books Profile Name

If you can leave Google Books reviews, please click the button “Click to add profile name” in the Google Books box.  Once we start accepting Google Books reviews, you will start getting the ARC offers for them.

In order for us to be able to find and verify your Google books reviews, we require you to enter your Google profile name, which is the name found in the Personal Info section of your Google account. Please enter that below.

You can enter this name in the box in the popup and click “Submit”.

You can view your Google Books profile name from this page once you’ve submitted it, or click the button to change it if needed.

The Stats tab on your dashboard tells you your Gem level, gives some basic stats about the books we’ve sent you and allows you to request a list of those books be emailed to you.

On the left side of this tab you’ll see your current Gem level.

On the right side of this tab, you’ll see some basic stats (as well as a circle graph to visualize these numbers) like total books we’ve sent and how many of those you have reviewed vs left a reason for not reviewing on.

If you would like to get a complete list of all the books we’ve sent, you can click the “Email Me List of All Books” button.  This will send you an email with a CSV of all of the titles.  This does not send the book files themselves, or any other information.

As we add more stats, especially once we start allowing reviews on sites other than Amazon, they will also be displayed on this tab (and this page will be updated as needed).

From Your Settings tab you can do things like change your genres of interest, set your username, change the email address we use to contact you, change your password, determine how ePub files are delivered and opt in or out to our romance newsletter.

Genre Interests

The ARC books that are available for sign up on the New ARCs Available tab are determined by the genres you indicated you were interested in reading when you first signed up. If you wish to change those selections, you can do them from any time from Your Settings. Just add a checkmark for any of the genres you wish to see offers for, and remove it from any that you don’t. Then make sure to click the Update My Genre Preferences button to save your changes. Any updates will be applied immediately, so after you save your changes you can go to the New ARCs Available tab and you will see the books in those genres.

Note that if you removed any genres for books that you already signed up for or were previously sent, those books will remain in on your dashboard and you are still responsible for completing the reader forms for them.

Account Settings

From this section you can add a username, update your email or change your password.

Set Username

By default your username is your email address, but you are urged to change it to something unique and unidentifiable to you as it will eventually be used publicly in things like leaderboards (so we HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you DO NOT use your real name) or displayed at the top of your dashboard. You can only set your username one time, so choose carefully.

Change Email Address

You can change the email address that we use to send you things like your ARC covers, review reminders, and all other correspondence. The email we currently use is shown, but you can change it by typing in the new one and clicking the Change button. Note that you will need to validate your new address by clicking the link in the email we send to it, and a verification email will also be sent to your previous address (no action needed for that).

Change Password

You can change your password from this section by entering in your old password and then your new password in the two subsequent boxes. Be sure to click the “Change your password” button to save it.

ePub File Delivery Options

Most of the books we send will give you the option of either PDF or ePub. If you choose the ePub option, then how it is delivered depends on your settings in this section. Click here for more information on these options.

Most of your preferences and settings can be changed from Your Settings tab, but below is a list of the different things you can change and set and where to find them.  Click the link to go to the FAQ about the specific tab that the changes you want are found on for more details.

From Your Settings tab, you can modify the following settings and preferences:

• Genre Interests – this is the list of genres that you indicated you were interested in when you first signed up, and determine which offers you see in your New ARCs Available tab. If you change the list, your set of book offers may change.
• Username –  Your username is a unique name to Hidden Gems and may, in the future, be displayed publicly (like in leaderboard lists) so we HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you DO NOT use your real name.  If you do not set your username, the default is your email address and in that case we would not include it in any public lists, but we do encourage you to set it something else.
• Email address – You can change the email address we use to send you various notifications and reminders
• Password – You can change your password if you’ve created one
• Romance Newsletter – Opt in or out of our romance newsletter email
• eBook File delivery options – Determine how you want the ePub book files sent to you, which is explained in more detail here.

From Your Profile Links tab, you can modify the following settings and preferences:

• Review Profile links – If you haven’t already submitted them, you can add your profile links or names for all of the review sites where you can leave reviews (Amazon, Goodreads, Kobo, Barnes and Noble, Bookbub, Apple, Google). This will determine which book offers you get, although currently we are only sending Amazon books. But we are collecting the profile info for the other sites now so that you’ll be ready to get offers for those as soon as we are done adding support for them.
• ARC Sign Up Email Delivery – You can opt out of getting the daily ARC sign up email (the one that includes all the covers and genres of the new books offered that day) although we highly recommend not doing so, as this email is a reminder about the new books and without it you may miss offers or forget all about us!

Email software programs and services have very strict filtering rules these days, and will often identify newsletters and emails coming from mailing lists as spam or junk, even in cases where the person receiving them has specifically signed up for them, as is the case with us.

As emails are critical to the Hidden Gems program, it is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that you both add our email (contact@hiddengemsbooks.com) to your contact list, and take a few moments to follow these simple instructions to whitelist us with your specific email provider.

If the email you’re not receiving is the daily new ARC sign up email, it could be that you have accidentally told our system not to send you those. On your dashboard, click the Your Profile Links tab and in the AMAZON PROFILE LINK section, you’ll see a checkbox at the top labeled:  Stop sending Amazon ARC sign up emails

If there is a checkmark in that box, just remove it and you should start receiving the daily ARC sign up emails again.

But if you are still having issues with emails after doing the above steps, remember that the New ARCs Available tab on your dashboard is where you go to sign up for new ARCs, and the email is only a reminder and notification of the new books available.  So even without the email, you can still sign up for the books you’re interested in via your dashboard.

There are no quotas on books you have to ask for or are allowed to ask for. You can sign up to read as many or as few as you want and think you’ll have time to read by their review dates (although getting reviews in past those dates is okay, too, but please try to get them done as soon as possible).

The number of books you read has no bearing on your status as a reviewer and whether or not we will continue sending you books (although there are other factors that affect that). You read when you have time. If you stop signing up for books for a week or a month or a year, and then all of a sudden you request one again, it will be like you never stopped.

The only thing that affects your status as a reader with us is the consistency with which you fill out our reader forms and seem to be participating with the books that you HAVE asked for and were sent. Remember that our membership is made up specifically of people that love to read and leave opinions of what they read on Amazon – although we know that not everyone will choose to review every single book they’re sent.

So just make sure that when you do sign up for a book, that you have the time and desire to read it and you’ll try to do so as soon as possible. The review date is more of a date to aim for that the author is hoping most reviewers will be able to finish by, but it’s okay if it takes you longer. The date is always at least a week from when we send the book out to the chosen reviewers – and sometimes even longer – but if you happen to finish reading early and the book is already published, feel free to leave your review and fill out your reader form as soon as you’re done.

Books are open for sign up for approximately 36 hours, and once we have chosen the list of reviewers we will send you an email to let you know that you were chosen.  However, as emails can get lost or missed, you can also find a complete list of books that you were chosen for on your dashboard.  The Books You’re Reading tab shows all of the books that you have been sent that you haven’t finished yet (based on the fact that you didn’t fill out the reader form) and the Completed Books tab shows all of the books that you have already finished.

Due to the issues with email deliverability, it’s a good idea to get in the habit of visiting your dashboard regularly to make sure you are up to date on the books we’ve sent or even the books available for sign up.

And remember that even if you didn’t know you were chosen for a book until much later than it was sent, you can still read it!  It’s NEVER too late to read and review a book we’ve sent you.

There are a number of factors to consider here. The most important one is that each book only goes out to a limited number of readers, and we have thousands of readers signed up to our ARC program. While each book only appeals to a subset of those readers, in some genres there are still often more sign-ups for a book than copies we can send out. So while there is an element of chance that goes into things when all else is equal, here are some other factors that we may consider when making our reader choices in cases where there are more sign-ups than copies available.

• You haven’t been filling out your reader forms
  Fill out the reader form for EVERY book you are sent. Whether you reviewed the book or not, even if you never even read the book – you still need to fill out the reader form. If you didn’t review the book on Amazon, just select your reason for not reviewing instead. At least then we know you are still actively participating. Remember that you can access all of the reader forms you’ve missed from your dashboard, so please stay on top of filling them out as soon as you’ve finished with the book. Not filling out your review or reason field affects your gem status, and that status is an indicator of how close you are to not getting books anymore – so be sure to keep up!
• We don’t seem to have any books that interest you
  As we said, missing the occasional review is understandable, but if you’re regularly leaving reasons why you couldn’t review instead of your actual Amazon review links, then it could be that our books just aren’t for you. People that sign up for our program are ones that love to read and leave their opinions on Amazon of what they read and while those reviews are completely voluntary and it’s understandable that not all books will connect with all readers, if none of our books are good enough for you that you ever feel like reviewing them, then it’s likely we just don’t have the books you’re looking for. If that’s the case, it’s only fair to the authors that are providing us with the books, and the other readers, that we send them to people that do like this sort of content which means you may start to get less of them.  However, if that’s not the case and there are some other reasons for your issues, just let us know. Also remember that our review dates are not hard deadlines, and some readers take longer to read a book than others, so even if you finish a book later and review it, you can always fill out the form when you do.  Better late than never!
• We’ve sent you other books that day/recently
  We try to limit the number of books we send to an individual reader to 1 per day (with the occasional exception when one of the books is a non-fiction (cookbook, self help, etc) or children’s book and the other is a novel) to give everyone a chance to read, but also because Amazon sometimes limits the number of unpurchased books that can be reviewed by a particular customer. As well, if there are more sign-ups for a book than copies we can send out, one of the things we look at is how recently we’ve sent you books – favoring those that haven’t been sent any in a while over those that have been sent a book more recently.
• The book you chose got cancelled by the author
  Schedules change all the time for authors, and while most of the time they give us plenty of notice, there are rare occasions where an author has to cancel their ARC after it has already been open for sign up. In those cases, we can’t send the book out to anyone, not just you!

How can you improve your chances at being picked for a book?

• Sign up for all the books that interest you (even more than 1 per day)
  If you see 2 or even more books in a day that interest you, feel free to sign up to all of them.  It’ll increase your chances of being chosen for at least one of them. We do make an effort not to choose readers for more than 1 book a day (with certain exceptions, see above), but even if it happens feel free to read the books one at a time. If you miss the review date, that’s fine – better late than never. Just don’t sign up for others until you’re done (or almost done) with the ones you were already sent.
• Sign up for multiple genres
  Certain genres (like Romance) have a plethora of readers while others have far fewer. You’re far more likely to be chosen for a genre with less overall sign-ups, so the more genres you’re signed up for, the more offers you’ll get and the more likely you’ll get picked for something.  You can view and edit your list of genres from the Your Settings tab on your dashboard at any time.

Our ARC books are usually sent in 2 different formats, each with their own benefits and uses, and readers can choose the one that works best for them and their device. Note that to use either of these files, just click the corresponding link in the email we sent you (indicating you were chosen as a reader for the book) or via your dashboard (via the Books You’re Reading tab).

PDF Format

A PDF file can be read by most devices and you can usually open it just by clicking on the link we sent. This normally opens the book up and the user can begin reading immediately. This format is best for graphical and colorful books, like illustrated children’s books.

Samsung users please note: Samsung devices can sometimes cause issues when attempting to view PDF files due to application defaults. You can reset these defaults using this method:

1. Go to Settings > Apps > All
2. Scroll to Google PDF Viewer app and tap it.
3. Scroll down to the “Launch by Default” section and tap the “Clear Defaults” button.
4. You can also try Settings > Apps > Drive and then repeating steps 2 and 3.

ePub Format

Most eReading devices, including Amazon’s kindle, support the ePub format. For kindle devices and apps, the ePub can be sent to your @kindle.com email address (more details below).  Other devices may have different ways to load your ePub, so you may need to consult with the instructions of your particular device if you aren’t sure how.

ePub File Delivery options

There are 3 options when it comes to how we send you the ePub file, and you can view or modify these settings via the Your Settings tab of your dashboard.  Just select the option you prefer and click SAVE.

Direct Download – If this option is selected, when you click the ePub link for a book we’ve sent you, the ePub will immediately be sent to the device you’re using via a browser download. Depending on your device, you would then have to find this file and load it onto your eReader.

Send file via email – If this option is selected, whenever you click the ePub link for a book we’ve sent you, the file will be sent as an attachment via email to the email we have on file for you (the one you signed up with, and that we send our other emails to).  This option works well for people using iOS devices since there is no file system to find the files sent directly via the first option.

Send directly to my kindle – This is a new option available where we can send the ePub directly to your kindle device whenever you click on the ePub link for a book we’ve sent.  In order to do this, there are a couple of set up steps.  First, when you select this option, a new field will appear asking for your @kindle email address.  This is the address Amazon has associated to the kindle device you want the book sent to.  And then you must also go onto Amazon and add “kindle@hiddengemsbooks.com” as one of the email addresses that are approved to send to your device.  More details on those steps below, in the section on sending the file to your device manually.

Manually sending ePub files to your Kindle Device

If you don’t want us to send the file to your device directly (which is much easier, see above for more details), then you will have chosen one of the first two options for getting your ePub file.  Once you have it, you’ll need to send it to your kindle device so that you can read it on there.  We have a quick video on how to do that, or you can follow the steps below:

1. Navigate to  https://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle and click on “Devices” (you may need to log in to Amazon first)
2. Select your kindle device and note down the @kindle.com address
3. Click Preferences and then Personal Document Settings and verify that your own regular email address is added in the Approved Personal Document Email List (if it’s not, add it)
4. Go to your email program and send an email to the @kindle address you noted down above, and add the .epub file as an attachment
5. Within a few minutes, the book should be available on your kindle!

For future books, you will only have to repeat steps 4 and 5 to get them onto your kindle.

Trouble adding attachments to your email on your device?

As some devices (like iOS based ones) don’t allow you to download a file directly so that you can attach it to an email and send to your @kindle email address, there is an option on your dashboard to have the EPUB or MOBI file emailed to you directly. If that option is selected, then whenever you click those format links in our ARC emails, you’ll get an email with the file attached instead of it downloading to your device directly. You can then forward this email to your @kindle email address to complete the steps above.

Reading files in a Kindle App (any device)

In order to view your ebooks within your Kindle reader app, the steps depend on what sort of device you’re using, but these simple instructions should help.

Having Issues Reading Files on Your Kindle Fire?

Here are some specific steps to try if you’re using a Kindle Fire device:

1. Open the Books app and click the “hamburger” icon in the upper left (the three stacked horizontal lines).
2. Click “Collections”, then the little plus sign on the top right to create a new Collection. Call it something like “ARCs”.
3. Add any old Amazon-bought book into your new Collection (only needs to be one) and then click “Add” at the top right. Note: never remove this “anchor” book from the Collection, or the Collection will disappear.
4. Go back to the Home screen and open the Docs folder. All of the books that you’ve emailed via Send-to-Kindle that have been processed by Amazon should be listed. For each that you’d like to add to the ARC Collection, just click the three vertical dots on the right, then “Add to Collection”. Check the box next to your new ARCs Collection and click “OK”.
5. Now if you go back to the Books app and click either the hamburger icon again and the Collections OR you can click “Sort” and then “Collections”. Either way, you should see your new Collection contains all of the books you added from the Docs app. They should function just like any other book in your Library.

Note: Once you’ve set up your Collection via steps 1-3, you will not need to repeat those steps to add more books. Simply add new books to the Collection you’ve already created.

Most important – these book files are for your personal use only.  Please do not share them with anyone.  Instead, why not just encourage your friends to join Hidden Gems themselves?

YES!  Whenever an ePub version of a book is available (which is most of the time), we can now send the book directly to your kindle device or kindle reading application.  It does require a bit of setup on your end (in terms of adding our kindle email to your Amazon trusted list allowing it to send to your device, and providing us with your @kindle email address) but you can do all of that quickly and easily via the Your Settings tab of your dashboard.

You can find more detailed instructions on setting it up in the ePub section of this FAQ question.

First of all, please make sure that you’ve taken the steps to ensure you’re getting all our emails.

If you’ve done that and can’t find our book links emails in your spam/junk folders, you can still get the files from your dashboard (if the books aren’t too old).

Just navigate to the Books You’re Reading tab of your dashboard and find the book you’re missing the files for.  You should see a link that says “Need the book files again?”  If you click that link, you will then see the options for the files in the formats available (usually PDF and ePub) and if you click on the one you are interested in, you will download or be sent the files immediately (depending on your settings).

Note that book files are only available for a limited time, and once they’re removed the links above won’t show up as the files are removed from our system.  So please make sure to download them as soon as you can, even if you don’t plan to read them immediately.

IMPORTANT NOTE: If you still can’t figure out how to leave a review after reading this section, please contact us and we can help! Don’t give up or ignore your reader forms, or you’ll stop getting new books!

If we’ve sent you an ARC book, then eventually you’ll need to fill out your reader form, which basically just means sending us a link to your Amazon review (or reason for not reviewing), and optionally adding in a comment to the author. All of this can be done from the Books You’re Reading tab on your dashboard, and but we’ll send you a few email reminders about it if you’ve forgotten.

But in case you aren’t sure how to leave your Amazon review and send it to us, here are the basic steps.

1. Write your review on Amazon

   Although you could search for the book on Amazon yourself if you like, sometimes it’s confusing since often there are books with the same or similar titles. That’s why we always include a link directly to the correct book on Amazon, which you can find within the book info section of the Book’s You’re Reading tab on your dashboard.

   

   Clicking that link will take you directly to where you can leave your review on Amazon, so we suggest doing so as soon as you’re done reading. Ideally this would be on or before the review date, but if it takes you longer to read that’s okay too.  Just get it done ASAP. Better late than never.

   Note that if that link is not on your dashboard, it means that the book has not yet been published, and once it is we’ll add the link.

2. Wait for Amazon to approve and post your review

   Sometimes your review is posted immediately, but other times Amazon displays a message that they will review your review and post it once it’s approved. If that is the case, you must wait for your review to be approved before you can send us the link. Sometimes it takes Amazon hours, sometimes days, to approve reviews. Nothing you can do but wait, although they usually send you an email once they’re done. Just keep in mind that you can still request and review other books from us while you wait!  You don’t need to wait until you send us your link before signing up for other books.  And don’t worry if it doesn’t get approved by the review date, those dates are just guidelines to aim for and it’s fine to send it in later.

3. Click the “Find Your Review Automatically” button on your reader form

   Hidden Gems has no ties to Amazon, so the only way for us to know that you have left your review is for you to tell us that it is posted and approved, and we have made that very easy via the “Find Your Review Automatically” button* on your reader form.

   

   Clicking this button will alert us that your review is ready for us to go and find. When you do click it, you’ll be able to add an optional comment (see next point) and then this book will disappear from your dashboard temporarily while we look for your review.  The process of finding your review can take some time, and if we can’t find it we will keep checking for a couple of days but eventually if we still can’t find it, we’ll send you an email letting you know and the book will be placed back on your Books You’re Reading tab. Most of the time this happens when people click the find review button before their reviews are approved and posted by Amazon (although the email we send will outline some other common reasons as well).  Remember we can only find it once they do that, so please wait until it is posted before clicking it. But if you do it accidentally, you can just click it again once we replace the book and your review is ready.  If we do find your review, the book will move to your Completed Books tab.

   *If you haven’t yet added your Amazon profile link, you’ll see a link to do so here instead of the find review button. Click that link and follow the instructions to add your profile link first.

4. Optional – Leave a personal comment to the author

   If you wish, you can leave the author a personal comment about the book. This is sent to the author at the end of the ARC period, and is normally used to provide thanks or feedback about the book that you didn’t want to include in your Amazon review, or even comments about why you didn’t review. If you do leave a comment, please make sure to hit the Submit button once you’re done.  You should not use this space for comments meant for Hidden Gems, nor should you provide any personal contact info (such as name, email, etc). Any such comments will be removed.

Note that even once your book has moved to the Completed Books tab, you can still go there to submit your comments, view your review links (if you’ve logged them with us) or even tell us to look for reviews for books you previously left reasons for not reviewing.

The term “Reader Form” is a holdout from our old dashboard design where we had a specific form for each book that we called a reader form.  With the new design, the fields that made up the reader form (Review, reason for not reviewing and comments) have now been integrated right into the other tabs, making the term a little less obvious but it helps to be able to refer to those fields as a single thing – so we’re sticking with the term “Reader Form”.

Whenever a reader finishes reading one of the ARC books we’ve sent them, the expectation is that they will fill out their reader form.  That is, they will either submit their review link (which can be done at the click of a button) or provide their reason for not reviewing. Optionally, they can also provide a personal comment to the author about the book.

The reader form fields and buttons can be accessed from either the Books You’re Reading tab (which is the most common way to fill them out) or from the Completed Books tab (which is really more of an edit of those fields, since books only move to this tab when you already submitted your review or provided a reason for not reviewing – so for example, if you previously provided a reason for not reviewing but then later left a review, you could update your reader form from this tab).

The following is a description of the 3 different reader form fields/buttons and how and why you would use them.  They work the same way regardless of which tab you use them from.

Submitting your review links

The ideal case is for ARC readers to leave Amazon reviews for each book that they are sent. If they have left reviews in the past or at least submitted their Amazon profile, then submitting your review link is VERY simple and quick.  After you have written your review on Amazon AND your review has been approved and posted by Amazon (which can happen immediately or take days, not much you can do about it and we are aware of Amazon’s occasional delays), then all you need to do is find the book on your reader form and click the “Find Your Review Automatically” button.  This tells us your review is ready, and we’ll find and add it to your reader form for you.  If we can’t find it, we’ll send you an email letting you know, along with some potential reasons why.  In the vast majority of cases where we can’t find the review it is because the Find Review button was clicked before the review was approved and posted.  If that happens, just click the button again once your review is live on Amazon. Alternatively, if you know the url for your review, you can add it to the review link field. Note that this field only shows up if you have already tried the button at least once and we couldn’t find your review.

If you haven’t yet submitted your Amazon profile, instead of the buttons, just click “Enter your Amazon profile link” to send us your link, and then you’ll see the buttons above.

When you can’t or don’t want to review

It is understandable that there may occasionally be reasons why a reader cannot or chooses not to review a particular book. That’s fine, we aren’t going to force you to finish a book you didn’t like, for example. In those cases, instead of submitting your review you can click the “I’m Unable to Review This Book” button and select your reason from the drop down.  Note that some of the reasons you can select will provide you with instructions on resolving your issue and then NOT save your reason.  For example, if your reason for not reviewing is that your review hasn’t been posted by Amazon yet then we will let you know to just wait and click the submit review button once it is.  Or if you are still reading the book but think you are late, we’ll remind you that it’s always better late than never to finish the book and the review dates are just dates to aim for, so it’s always better to review it later than not at all.

The important thing to remember is to only use this field if you will not be reviewing the book at all, instead of to just let us know that you are delayed. In those cases just leave the form blank and fill it in whenever you’re done.

Comments to the author

After you have either submitted your review or reason for not reviewing, you will be given the option to write an anonymous comment to the author.

This is an optional field, and is meant for readers to provide any additional feedback about the book that they didn’t include in their review, or thank the author, etc.  Please DO NOT leave any identifying information in this field as it will be removed (such as your email address, real name, etc).  Please do not leave comments about issues you have with the ARC program or anything that isn’t specific to the book or this author. Instead, send those via email to contact@hiddengemsbooks.com.

Remember that ARC readers are expected to fill out their reader form for each book they have been sent, it only takes a few seconds.

That’s up to you, as all reviews are your own.  However, since we know that as a reader you aren’t necessarily also a writer, we’ve written up some general tips for writing reviews on our blog. Remember, it’s okay if you don’t like a book, but be aware that there is a difference between a bad review and a “bad” review…

Sometimes our reader forms don’t have a link to Amazon where you can leave your review, or even if there is, the book may be on pre-order, which means no reviews can be left until it is actually for sale. 

In these cases, you cannot leave a review yet.  Remember that many ARCs are sent out before publication, because they want reviews to be left as shortly after the book is made for sale as possible.  While it’s great that you want to leave your review early, sometimes it just isn’t possible.  In these cases, you’ll have to wait until the review date or the book is officially published.  Don’t worry about forgetting, though, as we’ll email a reminder with the Amazon link when the book is live, which may be on the review date (or even after, if the publication date changed after we sent out the ARCs).  

Remember that the review dates are more of a best case scenario that the author was hoping for rather than a drop dead date, so it’s not a problem if you get your reviews in on that date or even shortly after.  Always better late than never. 

And don’t forget that you’re still free to go ahead and request and read other ones from us in the meantime.

If you have clicked the “Find Your Review Automatically” button but the book has reappeared on your Books You’re Reading tab, that means we couldn’t find your review. Please check your email as we have also sent you some common reasons and steps to fix them.  If you don’t see our email, please check here and follow the steps.

Here is the list of common reasons and steps to take when your review can’t be found.

1. You haven’t yet written and submitted your review on Amazon (but plan to)
   If this is the case, please leave your review ASAP and THEN try clicking the button on your reader form again. Note you should only click the “Find Your Review Automatically” button AFTER you have submitted your review to Amazon and they have approved and posted it (see #2 for more details).
2. You have submitted your review on Amazon but they haven’t posted it yet
   Sometimes there is a delay (hours or even days) in how long it takes Amazon to approve and post a review but in those cases they usually will send you an email letting you know it’s been done. Once they do that, try the button on your form again.
3. You are posting your reviews to a different Amazon profile than we have for you
   We can only find your review if we know who you are, so if you’ve recently changed your Amazon profile then click the button to change it on Your Profile Links tab (you can also verify the one we already have for you on that tab). Note that if your review has been posted and we have your correct profile, you should see it listed under that profile unless Amazon has enabled your sensitivity filter. You can read about what that filter is and how to turn it off, which we definitely recommend, but it is completely up to you.
4. You left your review on the wrong book
   If you did leave a review against the wrong book, please delete that review and repost it against the correct one, and once Amazon posts it you can try the button on your reader form again.
   Often books have the same or similar titles, so it’s important to make sure you leave your review against the correct book. Best practice is to use the links found on the Books You’re Reading tab. If those links aren’t available, it’s usually because the book is not yet published, so we’ll update it as soon as it is.
5. You previously reviewed this book
   In order to minimize how many reviews we have to check, we stop looking once the review dates are older than when we sent out the book (since normally it wouldn’t be possible to review the book before getting it.) This means that if you have reviewed this book in the past but then signed up to review it again this time, we won’t find your old review. In this case you will need to add it manually (the field to copy and paste your review link will be available in cases where we have failed to find your review). In fairness to the authors and other readers, please do NOT sign up for any book you have already reviewed.
6. Other
   There may be some rare circumstances where you have left your review and it is posted on the Amazon profile we have on file for you, but you are still getting the email that we cannot find it. If that’s the case, please send us an email and let us know so we can investigate. Include which book it is, and if possible, also include the link to your review if you know how to copy and paste it. Once you do that, we’ll try and find your review and add it to your form and see if we can identify why it wasn’t found earlier so that we can improve the process going forward.

In order for the “Find Your Review Automatically” button to work, your book review must be approved and live on Amazon. One way to tell if that’s the case is to check your Amazon profile page, as all of your reviews should show up on your profile. However, in some cases a book review does NOT appear on your profile, and that is generally due to one of two reasons:

1. Your review isn’t approved yet.  Amazon sometimes posts reviews immediately, and other times they spend time approving them – sometimes many days!  If your review isn’t approved, it not only won’t show up on your profile page but it doesn’t show up under the book either. In this case, there is no way to add your review link to our form, because your public review link doesn’t yet exist.  You may be able to see it on your end, but that’s a private edit only link that no one else can view.  In these cases, all you can do is wait for Amazon to approve the review. Once they do you can click the button on your reader form to tell us to look for it.
2. Your sensitivity filter is preventing a review from showing up on your profile.  Amazon has a filter which determines whether certain reviews will show up on your profile.  You can change those settings here. In this case, your review is posted but it cannot be seen on your profile (although can still be seen on the book’s product page). Note that we should still be able to find your review even if your filter is active, but it makes it harder for you to tell if it’s live or not.

We can’t and don’t force anyone to leave a review, doing so is voluntary. Besides, we understand that life gets in the way sometimes and that there are plenty of legitimate reasons why you couldn’t or didn’t want to leave a review.

Maybe something came up and you didn’t have the time to read the book that you expected (although please feel free to read it at a later date and leave your review then – better late than never!), or perhaps you just couldn’t get into the book and either didn’t finish it or didn’t like it and you don’t want to leave a negative review. That’s your choice and we know that not everyone will be able to leave reviews 100% of the time.

Whatever the case, when circumstances do prevent you from reviewing a book that you requested, we still ask that you fill out our reader form. In that case, you would click the “I’m Unable to Review This Book” button and select your reason instead of clicking the “Find Your Review Automatically” button. The important thing is that you click one of those two buttons for every book, so that we know that you aren’t just done with the program and that you want to remain as an active participant.

All that being said, our ARC program is designed for enthusiastic readers that enjoy leaving reviews on Amazon for the books they’ve read, so if you are regularly missing reviews then it could be that our ARC program isn’t for you. We aren’t going to remove you from the program for a few misses, but if it starts to get to the point where your reasons and empty forms are outweighing your reviews, then it’s usually an indication that our program isn’t a good fit for you.  Perhaps the books we send out just aren’t to your taste?  That’s okay… it happens.  So when it seems like we just can’t find any good books for you, or that you’re too busy to participate, we may start sending less books your way until you have time to catch up or we start getting more titles that are interesting to you. It’s only fair to both the authors of these books, and the other readers that want to enjoy them.

Your gem status is always visible on the left side of your dashboard, and is an indicator of how well you’ve been keeping up with the books we’ve sent you. If you start to fall too far behind, you may be prevented from signing up for any new books until you catch up.

Removal from the ARC program is up to the sole discretion of Hidden Gems, however if your circumstances change and you find you have the time to participate fully again and wish to be reinstated, please contact us and we will try and work with you to make that happen. We’re always happy to help connect readers with great books! That’s the whole reason for our ARC service!

When Should You NOT leave a review for a book?

Aside from your own personal reasons, here are a couple of times where you should NOT leave a review for a book on Amazon. Either contact us or use the reason for not reviewing button.

• Don’t leave a review for a book you didn’t read – that’s unfair to the author and other readers
  • If you decline to finish a book you don’t like and still decide to leave a review, be fair to the author and note why you didn’t finish it in your review so that others can decide for themselves if your problems with it would bother them. Or, don’t review it at all and instead just use the “I’m Unable to Review This Book” button
• Don’t leave a review for a book you couldn’t open or finish because of technical issues – contact us instead and we can help you out!
• Unsure what to leave in a review, or what goes into a good review? We have an article on what makes a good review, and even one about what makes a bad one.

The most common reason you may not be getting chosen for many (or any) ARC books anymore is because you are too far behind in filling out the reader forms and/or leaving reviews for the books we’ve already sent you. The best way to resolve that is to fill those forms out as soon as possible.

The easiest way to do that is simply go to the Books You’re Reading tab on your dashboard. From there, you’ll see all the books we’ve sent that you haven’t filled the reader form out for. In some cases you’ll even still be able to download the book files if you didn’t already do that.

Once you get caught up, you should find that you are being chosen for books again. But if you have any issues with filling out the forms, please let us know!

The Hidden Gems ARC review service relies on authors sending their books to us to supply to our readers. Each author only asks for a certain number of reviewers and we have thousands of reviewers signed up to our service. So in fairness to both our authors and other reviewers, we need to keep track of who is regularly participating and who is not.

We don’t penalize readers for missing the occasional review because we understand that life sometimes gets in the way of a book being read or finished – or there are occasionally legitimate reasons why a reader might not want to review a particular book. However, if readers are consistently not reading our books, or not connecting with them enough to want to leave a review, then it’s likely that our program isn’t for them.  Perhaps the books we have aren’t the type they enjoy.  That’s okay, but in fairness to the authors sending their books in the hopes of getting them read, and the other readers looking to get those books, we may need to limit the number we send to readers that have stopped participating until/unless their situation changes. Remember that even if you don’t read a book for whatever reason, or if you choose not to review one that you did read, you still need to fill out the reader forms with a reason for not reviewing. Too many empty forms is another indication that a reader is no longer interested/able to participate in the program.

Using all of this information, we calculate a status for each reviewer in our program. Since we are Hidden Gems, we describe the different status levels in terms of your Gem. You can view your gem status on the left side of your dashboard at any time, or in more detail via Your Stats tab.

There are 4 different Gem levels:

• Sparkling – This is the highest level and means that you’ve been keeping up with your reader forms – maybe you’ve missed some but not enough for us to be concerned. You will be added to the pool of potential reviewers whenever you sign up.
• Getting Tarnished – You’ve started to miss some books. We’re not overly concerned at this point, but you may start to find you aren’t getting quite as many books sent to you as before so that you have time to catch up. You will still be added to the pool of potential readers when you sign up for a new one.
• Tarnished – You’re in the danger zone now and really need to catch up on all the books you’ve requested and that we’ve sent. Maybe you need to be more selective in the ones you sign up for and only focus on ones you really have time to read and look interesting enough to you that you think you’ll want to finish it and give an opinion. You will likely not be getting too many of the books you request until you catch up a bit, but will still be added to the pool of potential readers when you sign up for a new one.
• Cracked – You’ve missed far too many books and in fairness to our authors and other readers, you will not be getting any more until you can catch up on the ones we’ve already sent you. You will not be added to the pool of potential readers when you click to sign up for a new one.

What can you do to improve your gem status?

Catch up on your reader forms for the books we’ve already sent so we know that you are still interested in participating (even when you didn’t review)! If you aren’t filling out the forms (they only take a few seconds, usually just the click of a button) then we have to assume it’s because you aren’t reading or enjoying any of the books we’ve sent.  If that’s not the case, then fill out the forms so we know and can get you back to reading!

You’ll see the books you haven’t filled out on the Books You’re Reading tab of your dashboard. Please fill in any missing reviews or reasons for not reviewing as soon as you can. If you’ve left reasons for books that you later added a review for, you can update those from the Completed Books tab as well.

We really don’t want to block any of our readers from reading new books so please do your best to catch up and only ask for books you have the time and interest to read. If you think your status is incorrect or have any questions about it, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Amazon’s description of their Sensitivity Filter is fairly brief, but in a nutshell, it was introduced years ago as a way for Amazon to automatically hide any reviews you write from your profile for products that THEY deem “sensitive”.

Up until very recently, this filter was opt-in where you had to go into your settings and turn it on for yourself, which is the correct behavior for this sort of wildly over-reaching feature – especially since anyone can already hide the reviews that THEY decide to hide on a case by case basis, simply by simply clicking the 3 dots next to the review link on their Amazon public profile and selecting “Hide on my profile”.

Unfortunately, around the beginning of 2020, Amazon decided that it was better for them to decide what reviews should be hidden on everyone’s personal profile and went ahead and turned the feature on for most Amazon customers.

Since Amazon posts no criteria about what they decide constitutes a sensitive product and seem to include a very wide range of products, many reviewers are finding most of their reviews have disappeared from their profile altogether.  The reviews still exist on the product page itself, but they no longer all exist together on the profile page of the person that left them – making finding those reviews much harder.

When we started informing our subscribers of this issue, almost no one was even aware of the filter or that it was the reason most of their reviews had started disappearing, and when they did find out they were upset that Amazon had turned it on for them without asking, and immediately turned it off. 

Since you can still hide reviews YOU want to hide individually, there is very little purpose to having this sensitivity filter turned on so we strongly recommend turning it off. 

To do that, from the Amazon link above click to Edit Your Profile. Go to your profile and then click the Edit your profile button. Then click the Edit privacy settings tab and uncheck the Hide sensitive activity flag.  Don’t forget to save!

If you’ve been with Hidden Gems for a while, you will have noticed a change to the ARC sign up emails we send out. In the past, your emails would have only shown the books available in the genres that you have selected and all of the book details were displayed, with a button to sign up for the book directly in the email. When you clicked that button, you would be navigated to the website to let you know if the sign up was successful or not.

A single short email giving the highlights (covers and genres) of ALL books available

In the current emails, you now see a much shorter email with just the genres and covers of ALL the new books available for sign up (regardless of your preferences) and to see the details (blurb, sub categories, word count, etc) and sign up simply click a book to go to your dashboard and you can still do all of that.

There were a number of reasons for these changes, although one of the biggest was the fact that depending on the size and content of the blurbs, many of those sign up emails were getting lost to spam and junk folders, causing readers to miss them  entirely.  Another reason was that sometimes books would be offered that didn’t fit genres very neatly, and thus they may have appealed to those that didn’t sign up for that particular genre that the author chose for them – yet those potential readers would never even be aware that they existed.

Dashboard still filters books based on your genres and shows all details and allows quick sign up

Most of what we were using the emails for can now be done better on your new dashboard, with the emails remaining as more of a daily notification of all the potential new free ARC books that are available to readers.  To keep the emails tight and less likely to get flagged as spam or junk, we now only display the covers and genres of all the books available but when you click to go to your dashboard your genre filters will be applied and you will only see the books that match your preferences, along with all the details and the sign up button. The difference is, now if you happened to see a cover in your email from a genre outside your normal interests and wish to read more about it – you can!  Just go to Your Settings tab and update your genres of interest.  Immediately, when you return to your New ARCs Available tab, you’ll see an updated list of available books based on your new genre selections.

ARC sign up notification emails can be turned off

And while these emails are still a useful notification of new ARC titles and a reminder about the program, for those that are in the habit of visiting your dashboard regularly anyway, you can even turn them off on Your Profile Links tab. While we don’t recommend doing this for most people (the reminders can be very useful), there are some that prefer less emails but still want to participate in the program and this allows the best of both worlds. (Note you may still get occasional emails about incomplete reader forms and the email letting you know that you were selected for a book that you signed up for).

To unsubscribe entirely from Hidden Gems, just click the “unsubscribe” link found at the bottom of any ARC sign-up emails we’ve sent you. Note that this removes you from our program completely, it is not meant for people that just wish to stop getting the daily ARC sign up emails. If you unsubscribe, you will no longer have access to your dashboard, book files, etc.

If your intention is to continue using the program via your dashboard and simply wish to stop getting the daily ARC emails, you can do change that setting via the checkbox on the Your Profile Links tab of your dashboard.

But if you’re having issues with anything to do with our program, rather than leave we’d love it if you reached out to us and let us know what the problem is so that maybe we can solve it and keep you reading!

If you still have any issues or questions after reading this FAQ, please feel free to contact us and we’d be more than happy to help! Our main goal is to help connect readers with new and exciting books by their favorite (or soon to be favorite) authors. If there is anything preventing that from happening, we’ll do our best to get it resolved ASAP.