ArmchairBEA: Experts Say…

Today is the last day of ArmchairBEA.  It flew by!!  Today’s post is a chance to ask the experts anything about blogging.  (or if you’re an expert or have learned a few things along the way, a chance to share your tips, hints and tricks).

I’m certainly no expert, but I do have a few things to share that I’ve learned in my 8 months…

1. Visit, read & follow other blogs!

2. COMMENT.

3. Use tags!

4. If your blogging platform offers a “draft” feature, use it!  Especially if you post multiple times a week; you can work on your posts a little bit at a time.  If you’re reading a book for review, you can also add notes to remind you of certain points you want to mention in your post.

5. To get more traffic, join challenges (if you have specific topics for your blog, like books) or weekly memes.

 

Now for my questions…

1. Do you think it’s necessary to eventually monetize the blog?

2. How do you partner up with local libraries/bookstores/etc.?

3. How do you turn down a review request tactfully?

4. How do you manage to keep your passion for what you write?

 

I’ve really enjoyed participating and only wish I had more time to visit more blogs and get my posts up earlier!  I would love to attend the BEA in NYC at some point in my lifetime and maybe meet some of you there!

Also, I was a Twitter Party #3 winner and was able to fill out the Giveaway form for one of the prizes: Super excited!

The Twitter parties were fun and I figured out it was way easier to join them from my computer as opposed to my phone.

ArmchairBEA: Beyond the Blog

Today’s topic is going “beyond the blog”: monetizing, writing reviews at other places, invitations to events, etc.

I haven’t done anything beyond my blog except for recently getting approved to review books from NetGalley.  That’s really exciting but at the same time a little nerve-wracking as now there are people expecting a review.  And of course, if they have such confidence in their work, they want to see a good review.

I think it would be great to get my reputation to the point where  people would seek me out.  I would love to have the opportunity to be invited to special events because of what I write.   And I’d rather get the recognition for my reviewing before making money off of it.  Primarily, this is still a blog for pleasure, though.  And I enjoy writing about books and meeting other bloggers.  I would never want it to feel like a chore.

 

ArmchairBEA: Let’s Talk Networking

I’m posting late today!

First, let me talk about the Twitter parties. Last night Twitter party #1 was held at 11pm EST, so I was in bed before it started.  I caught up on some of the tweets this morning on my way into work.  Looks like it was a lot of fun!

Anywho, today Twitter party #2 was held at 12pm EST, so I popped in a bit while on my lunch break at work.  I was happy that I could contribute and I started following a few new people and got a few more followers, so that was definitely fun!

Ok, moving along to today’s topic: Networking.

Even though I’ve been blogging since October (so for roughly 8 months), I still feel like a newbie and have a lot to learn.  I’ve never really considered “networking” in this process, but after seeing what some people use as networking, I guess I was inadvertently doing it myself.  I’m on Goodreads with over 700 total books on my bookshelves (with over 400 of them on the To Read queue alone!) and I’m part of a book club that was created here on WordPress but we moved to Goodreads for ease of discussion, etc.  And I have my blog linked to Twitter so if I have Twitter followers they’ll see the links to my posts.  I had my blog linked to my Facebook page for a while, but then decided to take it off (mainly because I didn’t like how it made it look like I had over 900 followers since I have 800+ friends on FB).  (My Goodreads account is linked to FB though).

I talk about my blog with people and I definitely interact a lot with other bloggers through weekly memes, reading challenges and now the ArmchairBEA.  Using these features seems more like networking to me. For example, I had never heard of Dewey’s Read-a-Thon and after seeing some  fellow bloggers participate, I definitely want to join in for the next one.

Not that long ago I heard about NetGalley from Geoff at The Oddness of Moving Things and signed up.  I requested a few titles and got turned down.  After a short period of neglect, I got back on it and requested a few more titles.  Imagine my surprise when I got accepted!  So I’ve been rejected twice and excepted 5 times!  It’s a great way to get my blog out there.  My first NetGalley review can be found here and I got a really nice email from my contact at the publisher after I published my review, which made me feel great!

But for offline networking, I definitely want to get into author signings and book events.  There is the Boston Book Festival held in (you guessed it) Boston. (at least I think that’s what it’s called) and it sounds really interesting and would be something I’d like to attend. (And Geoff – see above for a link to his site – mentioned that he heard they are looking for community lead sessions…go to his site and ask him about it!) I would love to look up some other events that would be easy to attend and aren’t costly.  And I definitely would LOVE to get to BEA at some time in my life.

I saw this great idea on Twitter today during the ArmchairBEA Twitter party:

Sarah ‏@BreaktheBind

I think it would be awesome if after #armchairbea is over we could put up a list of bloggers by city/state? May make it easier to meet up

What a great way to network offline, no??

ArmchairBEA: Best of 2012

Today is Day 2 of the Armchair BEA. Today’s posting topic is the Best of 2012.  I’m taking this to mean the best books I’ve read so far in 2012, not that were published in 2012.

So far I’ve read 20 books since January 1, so I’m going to pick my top 5.

1. The Night Circus, Erin Morgenstern

As you may have seen already, this is one of my favorite books.  Morgenstern paints such a vivid and wonderful picture of a circus infused with magic.  The characters are fantastic and the story is truly a memorable one.  There is also an online game based on the book: nightcircus.co.uk. (you can sign in using your Twitter or Facebook accounts, too).

2. Ready Player One, Ernest Cline

A really interesting read and a great look into 80s pop culture.  Interesting to see how we can become so consumed by technology (and scary too!)

3. The Map of Time, Felix J. Palma

A great historical fiction that includes some well-known historical people (H.G. Wells and Jack the Ripper to name just a couple).  I really liked the H.G. Wells character and wonder if the real person could have been anything like this character?  (Also, I kept thinking about H.G. Wells from the Syfy show Warehouse 13.. hehe)

4. Peter Pan, J. M. Barrie

This is my favorite animated Disney movie.  But I only read this story for the first time earlier this year.  Well, Disney made it more kid-friendly and softened the character of Peter Pan a bit.

5. The Eyre Affair (Thursday Next #1), Jasper Fforde

I read this a while back and didn’t really remember anything about it, so I decided to read it again. While it may not be the best piece of literature, it is an enjoyable story and I look forward to reading the others in the series.

(Each title links back to my review on the book).

Today is also the first Twitter party (scheduled for 11pm EST), but I don’t know if I’ll be able to stay awake for it…plus, what exactly is a Twitter party? hehe

ArmchairBEA: Introductions

I’ve learned about so many different things in the few months I’ve been blogging and the BEA is no exception. After hearing about I was jealous of the people who would be attending. But when I saw Sarah’s post about the ArmchairBEA, I was intrigued. So I signed up and I’m excited to see what it’s all about.

Today kicks off the week-long event with an Introduction. We choose 5 of the 10 questions to introduce ourselves.  So here are the five I selected with my answers:

1. Please tell us a little bit about yourself: Who are you? How long have you been blogging? Why did you get into blogging?
My name is Danielle and I’m from Massachusetts.  I’m an avid book reader (though I suppose that’s a given if I’m participating in this, right?) I’ve only been blogging since October, so for about 8 months now…wow, time flies!  I started blogging because I wanted to try something new.  I had a livejournal for a long time throughout high school and college.  But I decided I wanted to do more than livejournal and reach a larger audience.  I found WordPress and it just went off from there.  You can see in my About page that I really love to read and love being able to share the experience with others.  I love the idea of teaching children how to read and exposing them to what a wonderful world books can bring to them.

2. What are you currently reading, or what is your favorite book you have read so far in 2012?
I’m currently reading The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.  It was a slow start for me, but now I’m really getting into it, and I’m about halfway through it.  As for my favorite book so far in 2012, I think it would have to be The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. I love the picture that was painted.  If that circus existed in real life, I would absolutely go.  

8. What literary location would you most like to visit? Why?
This is a good question. I think first I would like to visit Hogwarts. I mean, really, who wouldn’t?  All that magic, and moving staircases and pictures. There’s lots of fun stuff there.  Ohh, or maybe Diagon Alley or Hogsmeade. Those would be fun places to visit.  All those fun stores and the magic.  For a non-magical place, I would like to visit Thornfield  Hall from Jane Eyre, but before the fire.  I watched the Zeffirelli version from the 90s yesterday and the estate was definitely much larger than I imagined, though I fully admit that I don’t always picture things as they’re described, so to see it how Charlotte Bronte envisioned it would be cool.

9. What is your favorite part about the book blogging community? Is there anything that you would like to see change in the coming years?
I think my favorite part about the blogging community is the camaraderie. Everyone I’ve encountered has been so friendly and welcoming into the community.  They’re helpful. I never thought I’d have people commenting or regular readers; I didn’t know if anyone was going to be interested in what I had to say.
I think the biggest thing that bothers me is all the spam.  Luckily, it does get filtered, but it would be nice if it just didn’t exist. Of course, that’s just wishful thinking
Although sometimes when I try to post comments on people who have Blogger blogs, it doesn’t work; that’s annoying!

10. Have your reading tastes changed since you started blogging? How?
I haven’t noticed my reading tastes changing, I still like a variety of stories. I have started taking notes to prepare for reviews I post here,  so that’s what I’ve noticed the most: being more aware of how I want to talk about the books I’ve been reading.

I can’t wait to see how everyone else answered these questions.  And I look forward to see what else the week holds!