I love plans. I love writing them down because that’s when they start working. There’s no magic about it. It’s just about becoming mindful of your priorities. You write something down, you start working on it. That’s why I absolutely love New Year resolutions. I was just about to write down my plans for the next blogging year, when I realised I was not actually sure if I really wanted to do the following things.
1. Setting reading goals
Goodreads is the largest platform for all book loving people. There are book reviews, ratings, discussions. It’s like Facebook but with a higher purpose. You can also set your goals there, but they are only about the number of books you are hoping to read in a year. Thus, people try to reach goals of 60, 100, or even 300 books a year!
When people started sharing their end-of-the-year presentations made by Goodreads, it looked very appealing. There were stats, collages and some fun info about the books. I got really excited. I thought, that’s it! Next year, I’m definitely taking up the challenge! I was thinking of 120 books a year, maybe? But then I picked up The Essex Serpent by Sarah Perry… A few days ago I said that reading ten pages of Perry’s novel takes the same time as reading a whole young adult novel. I wasn’t exaggerating. It takes time to unravel all the beauty of Perry’s novel. Hurrying through the lines is simply robbing yourself.
And what about Patrick Melrose, the character from the novels by Edward St Aubyn? I’m really interested in his life, I can’t let him go. I also can’t read these books fast. They are short but I have to take breaks, to recuperate from what I’ve just read. Will I have to give up on all this just because I want to read a certain amount of books? I don’t think so … It’s a nice feeling to have read many books, but if there are no Perry or Patrick among those books, I don’t want to be reading at all.
2. Book review posts
Obviously, I’m not going to give up on writing book review posts. I love writing them, people love reading them. Although, according to my statistics, people love reading some other posts even more. My Why I Love My Book Blog post and Notes Of a Newbie In The Blogosphere one are the most read ones, while my review of Melmoth didn’t receive that much attention.
So, is just a review alone enough, or should it be something more than that?
3. Praising a book
Of course, I will continue raving about the books I loved (as well as criticising those I didn’t). But tell me, how often did it happen to you that you picked up a largely praised book and were just as largely disappointed? How much of this disappointment came from anticipation and excitement?
I absolutely loved The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt by Andrea Bobotis. (There’s no review yet, but I wrote a bit about the book.) I can’t keep the excitement to myself, but I do wonder if I will be responsible for someone’s too high expectations.
Am I overthinking it all or you also have blogsistential questions once in a while?
I am definitely not going to focus on my Goodreads reading challenge. I’ve done it two years in a row and it does become a race as to what to read, when to read it so I can achieve the goal. It’s nice and all but I’ve noticed it does take a toll on my reading. So, definitely skipping that this year!
Thank you for letting me know, Monica. I also get very competitive (and I love fulfilling my plans) so if I set a goal it will become a race. Meanwhile I already discovered so many good authors, I can’t race through their work. Why would I do this to myself? So, no goal it is then. 🙂
On a different topic, I had no idea people can comment via Twitter! How cool is that?! I clicked on your name and it got me to your twitter. Also, this beautiful rose in the middle of your name, it shows in my “reply to” field and looks absolutely gorgeous this way. The name is in grey font, but the rose is still bright red! Stunning!
I’ve been book blogging on WordPress for just over two years and find that reviews can be the least commented posts. It weird sometimes when we put a lot into our reviews and no-one leaves a word. Strange eh?
Well, at least it brings us pleasure. I think that’s what my attitude will be, a book review post is a treat to myself 🙂
Love it!
I keep the goodreads challenge cuz i love those stats and graphics at the end 😀 It’s fun. I just set easily attainable goals, cuz don’t want to stress myself over it.
Reviews should not be taken extremely seriously i think. You are right about the expectations tho. If i only see 5 star reviews, and then i think the book is a 2… well. I’m just happy someone liked the book 😀
I’m actually worried about a situation where I make a book sound like 100 stars (because I know I can get THAT excited) but the book is “just” the rightful 5 stars.
Those stats and presentations looked so awesome this year!
Hi! first-time commenter here! You’re one of the few literary book blogs out there, I am so happy to have found you!
Let’s make 2019 the year we solve the book review mystery! I hope to bring them back to my site. I think the trick is to figure out for ourselves what *we* love in a book review, and reverse engineer from there!
Hey! I’m sorry for the late reply, I hope you’ll get it. I didn’t find a way to subscribe to your blog so far. I know how you feel! I also used to feel lonely from time to time, with most readers reading something I don’t. It’s better now. I’ve discovered a few bloggers with similar reading tastes and now it’s much more fun.
As for the reviews – oh I can never shut up about a book after I finished it, regardless of whether I liked it or not, so reviews alone are easy for me. The tricky thing is to make them more interesting for other people, especially those who haven’t read the book yet.
Good to hear about The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt – that’s on my TBR list!
I feel happiness for everybody who has yet to read this book!
I read a lot of books this year, but I am going to set a really low goal this year again. Precisely because if I set a high goal I’ll probably read less xD (I swear it makes sense.) And yeah, unfortunately review posts always get less attention – it’s just the way it is. But we still all write them the most because that’s what our blogs are about 😀
I love writing reviews! That was the primary reason I started blogging at all. I have to say what I thought about the book. Well, you know it 🙂 I told you about it when you were preparing the blog post where I was mentioned.
I decided not to set any goals at all. I really love full-blown, stress-inducing challenges, but it’s usually about sport. I don’t like it any easier and so there’s no point for me in a reading challenge at all.
I also loved writing reviews, but it got old after two years 😀 but I’m starting to like writing them again 🙂
These are all legit blogsistential questions. Last year I didn’t join the Goodreads Reading Challenge because I don’t wanna plat the numbers game but now I am thinking of re-joining.
Discussion posts are way more interactive than review posts. It’s a grim fact for peeps like me who enjoy writing reviews. I wouldn’t totally ditch doing it. I don’t know, I guess I’ll try harder to make my reviews more appealing?
Ah, the hype monsters that we create by uber praising books that we like. How to deal with this? Pray, tell me.
Jennilyn @ Rurouni Jenni Reads
Hi Jennilyn! Sorry for the late reply! So did you join the challenge eventually? 🙂 I decided I definitely won’t, but I will be logging in my books there so that I can keep track of them. I think, maybe people find it easier to participate in a post that’s not a review. When it’s a review many will think that if they haven’t read the book yet, they don’t really have anything to say about it. As for hype monsters (great term) no idea. I hope I won’t ruin beautiful books 🙂
I always set myself a relatively low (for me) Goodreads goal, lol. Like you, I like a little challenge, and I LOVE logging what I’m reading, finishing, and wanting to read on the site; but, I hate feeling pressured or rushed when it comes to my reading. I love reading and the escape it gives me. If I start to focus on stats, I will lose my love of it a little bit, and then….it’s just too awful to contemplate! lol. So, I say give yourself a reasonable goal, if you give yourself one at all. 🙂
Well, I will be definitely logging in my books on Goodreads, because it’s impossible to keep track of all of them via the blog only. I get lost even when I try to see which ones I read during one month.