Recently I've started doing more book reviews, and one of the most difficult things to deal with is picking up a book that just isn't 'your cup of tea'. As a reader, the usual instinct is to put it down and start something else, but as a reviewer, you want to give an honest opinion of the whole story, which can mean continuing even after a story lost you. The best way I found to do this was actually a rather simple concept: identify the problem, and go on.
Let me explain a little. Things will bug us as readers (a book talks too much in asides, the narrator thinks they're funny when they're not, there is too much profanity, or the prose is flawed). A reviewer has to find those things and isolate them. So you don't like the prose style. Set it aside and look at everything BUT that. Does the story line transition well? Are the characters dimensional? Is the editing okay? Each time you find a problem, isolate it and move on. The more of these stumbling blocks I find, the lower my review may be. But at least I can look at the story as a whole, and be honest why it doesn't work for me. That way, no book is punished because one thing bugged me.
Bonus Paragraph: What do I Review On?
When I review, I try to look at some key elements of a novel: readability, transitions, prose, characters, and plot. These are my big players whether I like or dislike a book. If a book has editing problems, word choice or organization issues, that's a mark down for me. If a book has awkward transitions from one scene to another, or one paragraph to another, that is another bad mark. If the prose is flat, and the story isn't written well, a mark. And if either the characters or the plot fall flat and aren't shaped well, a mark. World-building can fall into readability, which I also consider believability. In many ways, this helps me decide between a 1 and a 5 star book. A truly bad book would be missing all of these, and my favorite books execute them well.
