What is our mission at

Hear Our Voices?

“Our mission is to provide a space for marginalized voices to be seen and heard. Books by authors of color, LGBTQIA+, neurodiverse, and disabled authors deserve the same spotlight as their white neurotypical counterparts. Our blog tours aim to connect diverse reviewers with the authors who represent them, throughout all international and domestic social media channels.
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 Tours

  • For every tour, we request 15 Digital ARCs, 15 Physical ARCs, and 5 Audiobook ARCs (if available). If any of our tours have been modified to be Digital Only or a different breakdown than the one listed above it will be noted in our communications.

  • All our basic tours have 30 reviewer slots! Sometimes some tours are bigger depending on publisher requirements and length of the tour. We always note how big a tour will be when the tour is announced.

  • To be part of our tours you must be able to comfortably identify with the group of reviewers we seek, as described in our banners. You will also need at least ONE of the five platforms allowed for participation; a (public) Blog, Twitter, Youtube, Tiktok, or Instagram account.

    If you want to receive communications when you are eligible for an upcoming tour, you can sign up here: Sign Up Page

  • Not really, it is our intention to uplift smaller creators and platforms, so as long as you are of the representation we are looking for and have a genuine interest in reviewing and sharing the book with everyone, you are welcome:) . If you already have a big platform, you are welcome too! This is a space for all of us to come together and celebrate these amazing books.

  • Our requirements are simple. A written review posted on Goodreads is mandatory along with creative content related to the book on one of the five media platforms. You get a long list of creative content to choose from, so you can pick whichever one you think you will have fun making!

  • Yes, you can! When you join a tour with an Advanced Reviewer Copy (ARC), you do not take away an opportunity from anyone but instead add more support and content to the tour itself. So if you have an ARC and want to shout about the book anyway, you are welcome:)

 
 

ARCs

  • Yes, you can. We have a disability/accommodation box on our forms where you can note what kind of ARC would work best for you and any reasoning behind it, so we can make sure you can comfortably participate in our tours.

  • All International Reviewers will receive Digital ARCs for the tours they sign-up to participate in.

  • No, if you are a US Domestic reviewer who needs no accommodations, we make sure to alternate which creators receive physical copies every tour, so everyone can have a chance at receiving and reviewing physical copies during the course of their participation in our tours.

  • You will receive a confirmation email within 7-10 business days of sign-ups closing for a tour.

  • If you were assigned a Digital ARC, our usual turn around is about 7-10 business days after we send the final participant list to the publisher. For physical ARCs to arrive it may take 1-2 weeks depending on the warehouse situation at the publishing house. However, if we have not heard from the publishing company within 1-2 weeks, we will make sure to keep all tour participants updated on the status of their ARCs and when they will be receiving them, if we have that information on hand. If we do not have any new information you will be updated about that as well.

 

 Reviews

  • Yes. We send all reviews, negative or positive, to the publishers using your Goodreads links, for transparency and so the publisher can be aware of the book’s reception with #OwnVoices reviewers

  • If this is the case, please inform us as soon as possible. This does not disqualify you from participating in the tour, but it allows us to provide you with alternative content to post. We also ask that you do not post your review of the book on social media or Goodreads until the end of the tour.

    Even though you will be posting your negative review after the tour, please make sure that your review addresses the problems with the book and is not disparaging or disrespectful to the author.

    What makes my review negative?

    **If your review mentions more negative aspects than positive ones

    **If you did not enjoy the book

    **If you are disparaging the author

    Disparaging remarks include judgment about the author’s actual character and/or intelligence, opinions on the author’s appearance, speculation about the author’s gender identity, ability, and/or any personal information about their life, past or present.

    If you are ever in doubt as to whether your review meets our tour policy please feel free to contact us.

  • Please use discretion while tagging authors in your reviews. The goal of our tours is to hype up a book and its author. If you would like to tag an author in your review, please only do so if it’s a positive one. If you are found tagging authors in negative reviews, you will be banned from future tours.

  • We reserve the right to ask creators who post content not aligning with our tour policies to take their content down and will also have to consider your participation in future tours. We provide this page and our tour policy to make sure we can create a safe place for both you and the authors we work with, so please become familiar with it.

  • We understand that sometimes life’s challenges might prevent you from meeting your scheduled tour post date. Please let us know [by when], if this is the case so that we may reassign a date that works best for you. However, if we find that you have not met your commitments with us 3 times (without informing us), your participation in our tours could be revoked. We do this because we have a responsibility to the publishers to fulfill our agreements as promised.

  • Once you have posted all of your content for the tour, Please use our submission form to send us your links. Do not send them directly to our email.

Sign-Up Forms

  • No, please only provide the links for the platform(s) you have chosen, in addition to your goodreads account.

  • Yes, you can! We know many of you would love to have a heads up on when you are expected to post, or already have scheduled content, so in our forms, you can choose what date of the tour would work best for you.

    If you want to leave the assigning at our discretion you can choose Any Date.

  • A whole bunch!!! Take a look at our previous tour schedules to get an idea of what some creators have made.

  • Please use our feedback form to ask any questions regarding your tour schedule or other questions we didn’t cover!