Tagged: advice
Some More Advice for Book Bloggers
If you haven’t already, please check out the first part of this ‘series’ by clicking here. Read it? Good, let’s get started on Part Two of my completely unplanned, irregularly scheduled series.
There’s lots of advice for bloggers out there, but very few of it applies to book bloggers. I know I was learning things on the fly as I started The Mad Reviewer and I want some resources to be available out there so not everyone has to learn while they’re going like I did. Here are some pieces of advice I really could have used:
1. Don’t obsess about free books and ARCs, especially when you’re just starting out.
Although I had no idea it existed until a month ago, there is apparently quite some envy and conflict among the book blogging community when it comes to getting review copies from publishers and ARCs (Advanced Reading Copies). Not because getting free books in exchange for reviews is controversial, but because people get jealous of reviewers who brag about all of the free stuff they get. They make it seem like all of us get sent dozens of books per month from publishers, which most of us don’t.
When you’re just starting out you need to focus on learning the technical aspects of blogging as well as improving your writing and connecting with other bloggers to build up your statistics. There is no reason for you to obsess over free books when you’re already doing all of these things. I mean, truly? Free books are awesome, but they’re not the be all, end all of book blogging. I’ve been around for almost a year and a half and I’ve been sent 3 books by publishers—and one of those was by accident.
Seriously people, it’s not that big of a deal. It’s nice when it happens, but if not it’s not the end of life as you know it and it certainly doesn’t mean you have a bad blog. Continue reading
Some Advice for Book Bloggers
I’ve only been blogging about books for a year, so that makes me both qualified and unqualified to give advice about it. I figure I’m as qualified as most people out there when it comes to giving advice to random strangers on the internet, but please, take it with a grain of salt. There’s no way I can know your exact personality and set of circumstances, therefore this is more of an article with general guidelines rather than strict book blogging rules.
So why am I even writing this? Well, before I decided I would blog about books I went looking for advice specific to book bloggers. There was a shocking lack of it, especially for a newbie with virtually no knowledge of the industry and community. I don’t wish that feeling of flying by the seat of your pants on anyone, which is why I’ve compiled this article. Here are some bits of ‘wisdom’ I learned the hard way.
1. Be polite and flexible when you work with authors, but know when to put your foot down.
Being a book blogger who accepts indie and self-published submissions, I get to work one-on-one with a lot of authors. This is probably one of the best parts of my ‘job’ (aka volunteer work/hobby). However, there is one particular incident that I’m ashamed of and I want all new book bloggers to avoid.
A couple months into blogging I was sent a book by an author and gave it a not-so-great review initially. About 3/5 stars, if you’re curious. Since I let authors get hold of a copy of my reviews a week in advance of the publication date, this author asked if I could change the wording around a little bit to make it less ‘harsh’. She pressured me because she had spent the money to ship me a print copy of her book all the way up to Canada. I felt guilty about this and changed the wording and the rating so that it was a little less harsh, but never an outright lie.
This was a mistake I’ll always regret.
Honestly, being polite and accommodating is important when working with anyone (especially authors), but you have to know when to put your foot down. You have to set moral and ethical limits for yourself that you will not cross under any circumstances. I crossed that line once and vowed never to do it again; I’ve kept that vow. That is why I am always extremely open in reviews about when an author sends me a book in exchange for an honest review, whether it’s a print or ebook edition. And that is why I am telling all you new (and old) book bloggers out there that you need to stand up for your right to your opinion. It’s okay to give a mediocre, even negative review. What’s not okay is to lie. Don’t learn that the way I did. Continue reading