Negative Reviews

Recently I wrote a post about someone using the hurricane to sell books. I also posted a negative review of that book, which I shouldn't have since I hadn't read the book. I admit that I was wrong by doing so, but I am not wrong for thinking it was insensitive to use the hurricane to promote the book. What was wrong with just saying something like: check out this cool book by my buddy? Recently, the author has made several posts firing up her fans and sending them in my direction. They have sent me insulting messages and comments (very few of which I have read, I mostly just delete them). I have responded to a few, the ones who did not leave insults. Her fans (mostly women in their fifties and sixties who don't seem to have jobs or things to do other than comment all day) started by leaving me comments bashing me for anything and everything they could. They moved on to visiting my other social media, my author page, my twitter, blog, etc. Recently they have started leaving negative reviews for my book, Zombie Bite (which is a horror and not an urban fantasy). One person out of all of those negative reviews read the book and said that there is a passage in the book where the main character talks about how she is reminded of driving through New Orleans after Katrina. The reader claims that she believes I used the hurricane to sell books. I never used the hurricane to sell a book, I simply gave the character a backstory. She had survived Katrina, which did not cause zombies to roam the earth. I'm sure there are tons of books that mention Katrina. Characters are like people and each person goes through different things. I will admit that I am not a fan of Zombie Bite, and was considering taking it down and maybe reworking it. I wrote that book, short story or whatever you want to call it when I was going through a rough time in my life and I don't think that it portrays my best work. I actually hadn't written for a long time when I started working on Zombie Bite again and I rushed it out. I needed something to do to busy myself at the time I wrote that and it was kind of my crutch. Zombie Bite helped me feel better, but I do regret releasing it. It wasn't ready and maybe it never would have been. I stopped working on Hair of The Wolf for that reason. I hadn't outlined it and I felt that it deserved better. I put some distance between myself and it but I will be going back to it. I'm almost ready to release The Fortune Teller's Gift, something I actually worked very hard on. I outlined and edited it. It's something I'm actually proud of, which I couldn't say for Zombie Bite. I have expressed my feelings about Zombie Bite in the past, and I'm still not sure what to do with it. I just don't want my future novels to get hatred because of something that was just a misunderstanding. I never wanted tons of comments and negative reviews, I never wanted people trying to ruin my future career. I have wanted to be a writer for as long as I could write and these people think it's okay to ruin that. I want to make it very clear that I have never bashed the author, the only thing I had an issue with was her promotion and the fact that she is sending her fans after me. I tend not to review things, unless I do not like them, but I will be making a point to write a few reviews today on books that I have truly enjoyed. I also want to note that most of these people probably wouldn't have picked up The Fortune Teller's Gift anyway.