Back to Basics
When I first began blogging, I wasn’t even aware that there was such a world as book bloggers. It wasn’t until I met Booklogged, and then Lesley, and then Bookfool, Nan, Tanabata, Carl, Chris and Nymeth that I knew it existed.
I was filled with awe that there could be so many people like me, who loved reading, who loved talking about the books they’d read, who actually read books which were taken from places other than the grocery shelves’ wire racks of top ten bestsellers. I’d been living in a lonely world, let me tell you, with not many people who shared my passion.
But, then something ugly came into the picture: Page Rank. Technorati Authority. Rankings. Feeds. Stumble, Digg, and Twitter. People posting give-aways with more chances to win if you became a follower, or if you posted about their giveaway on your blog. Somehow, the whole purpose of being a book blogger, to share the love of literature, was tainted with the issues of popularity and power.
I don’t like it.
I don’t want to become a book pimp…posting on books because I’m paid to, advertising a bunch of widgets for other blog ’services’, consumed with worry about my status instead of my love.
Which is for books. Which is also for one another. Which is the whole reason I want to blog in the first place.
You can find additional, and much more eloquently written, thoughts on Linda’s blog here and Mark David’s blog here.
"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived, the things which God has prepared for those who love Him." 1 Corinthians 2:9 (NIV)
Ah, for the love of reading. That’s what it should be.
I agree wholeheartedly! I’m still a new blogger but I am amazed at how many people are out there do exactly what you described. Congratulations for speaking out and going back to the basics! Blogging should be about what you want to do, and we should never succumb to keeping up with other bloggers if it isn’t what you want to do.
While not precisely a “book blogger”, I certainly recognize the feelings you express.
When I began my blog, I simply wanted to write. Of course I wanted readers, too, and it all seemed so simple. I would string words together, and people would read.
Day after week after month I kept at it – with 20 readers, then 30, then 50 a day. It went on like that for a long time, and people said: if you want to increase readership, add memes, quizzes, videos, giveaways, contests, and daily posting.
I said no. I didn’t want to increase numbers, I wanted to share my love of writing with responsive readers. That’s still my stance, and even though I’m trying very hard to post more often than every six or seven days, I’ll take whatever time I need to make my readers’ visits worthwhile.
That’s what you do – make our visits worthwhile. I’m one who’s quite grateful.
Aw, there’s still a few of us left, probably more than a few. Great post.
Amen, sister.
so interesting you would blog about this today. I received an email from some one that wanted to advertise on my blog today. It’s been an interesting thought process. advertising, # of followers, amount of comments…it all entices us to leave our purpose and want more. A lot like the world….enticing us to look to ourselves instead of Christ.
btw, I’m not 50 yet….there was an “almost” in that sentence I wrote….I actually turned 49!!!
I try to be all this… I just hope it comes across that way!
You bring up some good points. For me, I’ve had to slow down my blogging so that I have some time to read. And I’d rather savor my books than rush through them in order to post.
More chances to win if you became a follower? Really? I mean, I believe you, but that’s hilarious.
I say this as someone who 1) has no mailing address, so no one can send me a book anyway, and 2) is currently following Sympathetic Character Week, which seemed pretty popular, with a two week appreciation of an obscure Scottish novelist (who, by the way, wrote at least one brilliant novel), a certain traffic-killer.
But enough about me – the great irony of this post, is that it’s author, Dolce Bellezza, is one of the greatest community-builders I have ever seen on the internet. Iit has always been obvious that what you do is out of a love for good books and reading.
You speak what’s in my heart. I wouldn’t want anyone following my blog just for giveaways and other things. I want my readers sincere and truly enjoying my blog, just plainly for what it is. Same as why I keep coming back to my favourite blogs (like yours), because I sincerely love reading them.
Your second paragraph is (and was) me. I began to blog as an outlet and a distraction, at a time when I was in great need of an outlet and a distraction. I blog about books because I love them; i blog about other things as they strike my fancy, and so I don’t bore the folks who are kind enough to visit. I blog to learn, and to connect…and that is what I find when I come here: connection, and something to learn.
Blog to learn. Very nicely said ds. That’s also why I read your quite insightful posts
Oh, boy. Here I am going to say something that contradicts you a little bit. While I do understand you and think that whoring it up for popularity’s sake is appalling, especially when you try to bribe people with giveaways, there is another aspect to this whole deal.
From the speculative ficton circle I have been hanging around with I know that most of us are dead serious about establishing ourselves as critics in the industry and through that gain a wider entrance into what is happening. We don’t want to simply appreciate the books we love, we want to be active in the processes that shape the industry in our genres.
We want to be as recognizable as possible so that editors take us seriously and make connections that someday might prove to be useful, when we ourselves want to start a magazine like a blogger started or publish a novel like a different one is hoping to. A third one even landed a position as an editor on a respectable anthology. And I hope to be break in the industry with the small doors I open with my blog. Which is why I am in on this battle for hits.
It’s not like we don’t do it for love of the books. I for one, mix a business aspect into it all. Hope we are still friends, even if I am not one of the few real bloggers.
I can also understand where you’re coming from Harry, and personally I haven’t yet found anything on your site that seems to compromise your integrity as a blogger.
If you put it that way, I also mix a bit of “business” in my blogging. But it’s only in the sense that I try to be professional and courteous when communicating with publishers and authors, especially when I’m being so bold as to ask for review copies of their books. But like you, I believe, I wouldn’t go as far as agreeing to promote a book I’m totally not interested in simply because I owe a publisher for giving me a lot of other free books that I requested. And though I’m not usually as frank and bold as you are with your reviews, I know for a fact that I have never lied about my impression of a book just to make it sound worth buying.
I believe on these aspects we have similar policies
I hope that there is no reason in future for anyone to doubt my integrity. I use these ranks as tools to help me promote myself in the field, hopefully earning me one day creative authority over some project and not for publicity’s sake. I can’t agree with being popular for the feel of it. I want to be taken seriously and sadly hits and page ranks are the way to go.
And thanks. I don’t consider myself bold, but I always aim to being frank.
I’m with you, Bellezza. Frankly, I find all the contests and give aways tedious at times.
And, btw, I agree with the Amateur Reader – you’re one of the greatest community builders out there!
cjh
Amen, and amen.
I wholeheartedly agree with you. Granted, I think I’ve done a few giveaways in the year I’ve blogged, and a few ARCs, but never to the point where it has taken over my life and my love for reading what I want. I don’t Twitter. I often feel like a slug because I don’t have all the bells and whistles, just good old fashioned book reviews, but then I remind myself why I’m here.
To me, you are an example of the perfect book blogger. Your posts are always heartfelt. You don’t make me work too hard to enjoy your blog. Just keep doing what you’re doing!
I also was shocked and so happy to find a community 1000s of people who love books-thanks to Bellezza I have discovered a totally new to me world of reading in the Japanese novel-many bloggers have found that the more readers and followers they have the more free books they can get-and who does not like a free book (Asia based bloggers like me and lot of others are left out of this so we dont have to worry about it!)-recently I did a series of post on stories of the atomic aftermath-some by writers nobody every heard of-some of them had only 2 or 3 google search results on them-I thought ok this is really going to lose me a lot of readers-it turned out to be good for my blog as I got a lot of visitors who came once when they searched for the obscure author and found my post then came back-people from all over-
Amen!
Beautifully stated, as always. You read my mind.
Love ya, Bellezza!
Very interesting post.
I’ve had my blog for about 3 years now. At first I resigned myself to the fact that family and friends were the only ones visiting. Then I got some activity because of something in the local press about one of my music-related posts. And so I know I got a bit of traffic from that. But I think the was shortlived. But then I find this world of book bloggers and suddenly people are reading my blog. It is great, but there is the temptation to think too much about attracting readers. I have had a few giveaways but I did those because I genuinely had stuff I wanted to share. And in my case they weren’t free goods from a publisher. And I must admit I was tempted to have some “requirements” that would have upped my visibility, but in the end decided that wasn’t the way I wanted to make friends.
Quickly, before I respond more individually to you, I want to say I hold give-aways. In fact, I ENJOY giving books I’ve loved away, and I have a give-away going on right now in The Japanese Literature Challenge 3. What I object to is hosting a give-away for any other reason than that you want to share that book.
I agree with this point. And it’s not difficult to distinguish when a give-away is being hosted for the purpose of sharing a much-enjoyed read as opposed to simply feeling obligated to promote a book because of some ties with a publisher or publicist.
Please don’t think of me as a hypocrite though. I have something that you might call a “tie” with a publisher, but they only send me books that I personally requested after careful consideration. And I firmly believe that I always write only the truth in how much I enjoyed a book. I guess I’m just very fortunate that so far every book I ask from publishers turn out to be good, if not great.
I love reading and sharing my love of books. I love meeting new people who like to read…and its fun to receive their comments and thoughts on books.
I also like giveaways…simply because they are for books I enjoy and that helps me share the love with readers. I like being able to do that.
Thanks for putting into words what so many of us think.
So agree with you!
and have to share my excitement, I have a copy of Her Fearful Symmetry sitting on my bedside table, and I am almost too scared to open the covers, because I know, that that means, Im going to read it, which means, it will no longer be a book waiting to be savoured. arg , do you know what I mean?
Yet, I am so not the patient type which also means, I cant wait to get into it! (please forgive that rather rambled sentence, but my words have disowned me today…)
Exactly – I blog to talk about books. Yes, I have the occasional non-book post, but my blog is as it says in the header “primarily about the books I’m reading with occasional other stuff thrown in”.
It’s that core group of fellow book bloggers I’ve come to know over the years who have become my book club. That’s the reason my blog continues to exist and those are the conversations about books that drive my blogging.
Bless you for posting this.
Ahhh, you are a woman after my own heart. Nice post Bellezza.
I think this is something a lot of us have been mulling over lately. I’ve seen some bloggers cut way back on the number of review copies they get so they can focus on what they freely choose to read, and people dropping out of memes.
I don’t do a lot of giveaways. I’ve done the “extra entries” thing on some, but not all – the extra entries are extra WORK.
I’ll be honest – I like having readers, and I like to attract new ones. But I’m trying to stay away from too many gimmicks to get them.
Great post, and food for more thought.
Hurrah! I hear ya. I’ve been thinking about this myself. I don’t think I’ve gotten too far away from what I started with. I enjoy Twitter for the extended community, but I don’t do as many giveaways as many others, and most of the books that land in my home for review are unsolicited and I read ‘em if I like ‘em. If I don’t, I just don’t! It’s all about the love of books.
Though personally I have nothing against bloggers who employ the practices you’ve mentioned, I can say that I share much of your sentiments, Bellezza; and I like to believe that though you are clearly frustrated by the wide-spreading of these practices in the community, you also hold nothing against the bloggers themselves who’ve been caught up in them.
For me, it’s a matter of keeping my blog my own. I feel that if I were to write a post that is practically commercial (or promotional) in nature, my blog would no longer be my own, or at least not in the context that I would’ve liked it to be. I have no problems, however, with writing good reviews about books that I enjoyed reading, and I’m always happy to post links to their websites so that my readers would have access to excerpts and extra material, including links to online stores in case the reader would be interested enough to buy a copy. But I don’t want my posts to be tied to any promo. For me, writing about the things that made me love a book is quite different from simply posting a clear advertorial. And though I very much cherish the blogging community, my blog is also not a social networking site. I keep a separate Facebook and Goodreads account for that purpose
If ever I’m followed or recognized, I hope it’s for my writing and not for anything else.
Like you, Bellezza, when I first started my blog I had no idea that it’d soon concentrate on books and literature. My original plan was simply to create a space where I could place my thoughts and have it safely kept so that I can go back to them again in the future. I’ve tried it with a hand-written journal the year before, but it didn’t work very well for me mostly because I can never seem to compose my thoughts in order with just one go; the ability to re-read and then re-write has been very helpful to me. So, as you see, it is my intention to keep my blog as an archive of things that have come off my head. And now that it’s become primarily a book blog, it’s my desire to keep most (if not absolutely all) of my posts centered on my readings; a blog that more or less carries the same feel of a personal journal (or reading notes, for that matter). If you think about, since when have you seen a personal hand-written journal contain promotional or social-oriented stuff, right?
And that’s mostly where my policy lies.
Every one’s comments have fascinated me. I wrote this post out of frustration that I was finding myself encumbered by numbers: page rank, status, authority. This is not a direction that I wanted to be going. I don’t want to be wrapped up in anything more than who I want to be as a book blogger: one who shares her love of books with fellow bloggers.
It’s funny how hot the topic of book give-aways became!
As I said earlier, I love giving books away. I started doing that with Buy A Friend A Book Week, and then I began giving copies away of books which I’d reviewed and didn’t feel the need to keep any longer. By no means am I implying that giving books away is wrong. In fact, if you go two posts down, you’ll see I’m giving away a copy of Your Family Constitution because I think it’s a worthy book. But, also because the author is willing to distribute them.
I just don’t want to lose my focus for my blog. I don’t want to be worried about numbers more than words, or subscribers more than friends.
Yes, you can count on me to understand you on this matter Bellezza. I know that you don’t mean to criticize others’ preferences in the way they blog. It’s just good that you have you have your priorities well defined. I hope you always enjoy blogging
This post certainly generated an interesting discussion. I’ve also cut back on the number of ARC’s I accept. And I’ve stopped following all of the rankings, etc. that I once did. And I’m not doing so many giveaways anymore and when I do I’m not adding some much “Work” to them. I’ve never Twittered in my life and I don’t have Facebook. And I don’t have any advertising on my blog.
But I’ve not problem with anyone else who does. I’ve had lots of fun with the giveaways I’ve done and been very happy to recieve a couple of books that way, too. Dakota, my dog, always picks out the giveaway winner. She seems to enjoy doing it and my partner and I enjoy the videos of her making her choice that I post.
And, I’ll be totally honest here, if someone wanted to actually start paying me to review books or pay me to advertise on my blog, I’d probably do a little happy dance. I’ve made full disclosure a policy on my blog and always state when I’ve received a book I’ve reviewed for free so I’d also state that I’d been paid to write a review should that ever happen. I don’t think it will though because the last time I checked I didn’t have that many readers and it’s rare that I get conversations like this one happening on my blog.
BTW, I stopped by here today via Sandy’s blog. Congratulations on the BINGO award.
I am basically a frustrated journalist
and so my blog is like a mini newspaper of books reviews, which I print without compensation, except for books I accept for review. I think bloggers can do a service too for those writers who may be good but have few inexpensive ways to get their books noticed but through blogs.
I try to write up all the books I’m sent/accept though I also don’t accept everything. The great thing about this is that I’ve been reading some good books I never would have otherwise. That’s the fun part.
And for the ego, I do check alexa. com to see how I’m doing in terms of reaching readers. Whatever and however you blog – have fun doing it! I agree with that Mark David and Bellezza!
Well said!
That’s very brave, Bellezza. I often feel that you’re the adult figure in this crazy book blogosphere
I often think of her as somewhat of our school guidance counsellor
Good ol’ Grandma Bellezza.
This post and subsequent comments make me sad. Why can’t we all just do what we want with our blogs? Why does what everyone else is doing affect what we think about what we’re doing? If someone wants to do giveaways or attract a readership why does that make them “tainted with popularity and power?” How can we really know anyone else’s motivations for their blog?
It can be hard to carve out a readership in a crowded field of book bloggers…which is a lot of the reason for some of the new giveaway rules. And yes it can be easy to get caught up in wanting attention and wondering about things like page rank, traffic, authority, etc. But it is just as easy to ignore those things and blog for the pleasure you describe, and to live and let live.
Whoa, Amy. I never said bloggers can’t do what they want to on their own blogs. I simply found myself becoming more aware of status issues than I did of reviews or fellowship, and that’s not why I want to blog.
You are so right. I think if you’re going to spend time blogging you should think carefully about why you are doing it. I’m sure that it’s satisfying to anyone to think that people are enjoying reading what they write / their thoughts but if you spend time commenting on other blogs just to get traffic then it’s not a real readership anyway – just a pool of people going round in circles!
So very true.
Hear hear!
Well said, Bellezza.
Blogging takes so much work, if your blog isn’t what you want it to be, it’s not worth it.
I have noticed the same thing in myself; worrying about stats etc. a little too much for my comfort level. Good reminder that our love of books is what it’s all about, and even if we aren’t the most popular blogger out there with the biggest readership, we can still love what we are doing simply because it brings us enjoyment and a level of community, nonetheless.
Oh, funny. My sentiments exactly. I’ve done lots of giveaways, in recent months, for the sake of getting my mitts on some interesting books and sharing the joy. But, I’m about to cease that practice and stop accepting any review books — with a few rare exceptions. I absolutely hate the fact that book blogging has been, in many ways, reduced to people looking at bloggers “numbers” to see whether or not they’re worthy to be asked to review books. What a crock. Definitely time to return to our roots, when blogging about books was a personal expression instead of a form of marketing.
Well said, Bellezza.
Amen!
I am so glad that I never got into looking at all the behind the scenes stuff with blogging. When my friend hosted me at the beginning he would occasionally tell me about hits and stuff and was often trying to get me to share that love of tech and stats but it just wasn’t in me. I’m not a numbers person by nature and it would take a supreme effort to become interested in it. I cannot keep up with what I do now, and never want my blog to become a burden. That is exactly what it would be if I structured it to achieve numbers, achieve popularity or what have you. It would become a job, and I already have more than one of those!
Kudos to you on sticking with the basics. It is always refreshing when you can stop and have these epiphanies and go back to things being more simple. They mean more that way, I think.
I find this to be a really interesting post because I just started blogging about books recently and I wasn’t sure what to expect. In fact, I wasn’t even sure why I did it. At first, it was an attempt to get me to re-focus on something that I loved: reading. I’m a college student and in so many ways, being in school has sucked at my love of reading. I frequently find myself too busy or too tired to read for pleasure anymore. I told myself that finding an outlet to share my love of reading would encourage me to make the time to read. This goal was met with mixed results.
What I have found in the blogging community is a reminder of why people read. Not only is it something that they love, but it is something that enables us to connect with others. I think even after the popularity contests and strange giveaway rules, people are still connecting over books. Granted they are putting precious hours into making intricate blogs so that they can earn a little something for all their hard work, they are still connecting over something I assume that they love as much as I do and that is reading. At least, that’s still how I see it. Maybe I’m being naive.
I don’t think you’re being naive. I, too, think that most book bloggers are connecting over something they love: reading. Otherwise, I wouldn’t continue with my blog. Thanks for visiting, and good luck with your college courses. You’ll find time to read again, I promise.