Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Book Blogger New Year's Challenge of 2014 - What Was Your Favorite Book Blogger Moment of 2013?

What Was Your Favorite Book Blogger Moment of 2013?

Oddly, my favorite book blogger moment of 2013 relates to a book blog tour. I generally dislike book blog tours, or more precisely I dislike participating in book blog tours. I simply cannot review books to a particular schedule. There are some elements that I try to keep to a posting schedule: I post my Musical Monday selection on Monday (usually). I post my participation in Parajunkee and Alison's Follow Friday on Friday (usually). I try to post at least one book review every week (usually). I have thus far been able to post responses to the questions of the Book Blogger New Year's Challenge of 2014 in a timely manner. So I can keep to something of a schedule.

But this hides the usual disorganization that dominates my reading and writing. While I try to post one or more reviews every week, I usually can't say until that week what those reviews will be. I simply don't have the kind of organizational skills that would allow me to say that the review for, for example, the Fellowship of the Ring will be published on February 3rd or some similar statement. The best I could usually do is predict that review would be published at some point in February, and even that is a prediction of dubious value. For the most part, I review books when I am able, fitting the writing in between the other competitors for my time - including my day job, which pays the bills. I have a tendency to make lists of projects to be done during the week that I hope to have done by a particular day, maybe by Friday. Then when Friday rolls around, I find that I've only completed maybe half of the list.

Given this backdrop, it should be no real surprise that I'm not a huge fan of participating in book blog tours. I simply am not capable of writing a review to be published on a set date. I've participated in only a few, but those few have been enough to convince me that I don't really want to participate in others. But sometimes, against my better judgment, I allow myself to get roped into one. And that is what happened last September, when I, for some reason, agreed to review Nu Logic: Rise of the Neos by Bill Gourgey for a book blog tour. Which I promptly forgot about, because that's more or less my modus operandi when it comes to scheduled events like that. For about a month I vaguely remembered that I was supposed to read and review the book by a particular date, but other obligations and commitments pushed it to the back of my mind until October 22nd, when I went back and checked to see what date my I was supposed to post my review. And the date I had agreed to was October 23rd.Which meant that I needed to read and review a 500+ page book by the following day. So I did.

Despite the fact that I hate book blog tours. Despite the fact that grinding through the book and then churning out a decent review in a single day was exhausting, this is my favorite book blogger moment of 2014. Because I now know that if I need to, I can do that. I'm not planning on doing it again any time soon - and I'm certainly not planning on participating in any tours for the foreseeable future - but I could.

Go to Day 7: What Are Your Top Ten Book Blogger Pet Peeves?
Go to Day 9: What Cons or Events Do You Hope to Attend in 2014?

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2 comments:

  1. I'm a huge fan of book tours when it comes to hosting an interview or a guest post, but trying to schedule a read/review is difficult. At that point, I find reading becomes a chore or a task, and it can really sap the enjoyment.

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    1. @Bob R. Milne: I don't have guest posts on this blog. I just prefer that all of the content on the blog be authored exclusively by me. I haven't done any interviews yet, but that doesn't mean I never will.

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