I’ve been sitting on this for a few weeks now — which is how I feel I start all of these posts about blogging and about reviewing. But I think it was really April’s post today that got me to sit down and hash out my thoughts a bit on this. So before delving in, I urge you to read her post about how blogging isn’t a competition.
Back in May I blogged about how blogging is hard. And I still believe wholeheartedly in that. Maybe more so now that I’m reflecting back on how the last couple of months have been for me when it comes to blogging. I’ve got a pile in a double digits of books I want to write reviews for, but every time I sit down to tackle it, even for books I am really eager to write thoughtful posts for, I manage to convince myself writing about something else is more worthwhile. I’m not sure whether that assessment is or isn’t true, but it pulls my mind away from working on the task in front of me.
I am and always have been the all or nothing type, and it goes into everything I do. I blog and I blog with my whole heart. I read and I read with my whole heart. I write and I write with my whole heart. I think anyone who knows me would say that about me and I hope that those who are close to me would say that that’s how I am with people I care about, too. It’s just who I am.
But when I find myself in a dry spell in an area, I cannot make myself do anything relating to it. So I’ve hit this dry spell in writing reviews that’s lasted for months now. Even as I felt like I finally broke through the wall this week by writing a lengthy — and I think strong — review for a book I’m posting later this month, I stepped back after I scheduled it and wondered: why?
Blogging is and always will be something I do for myself, but more than once I wonder why I do it. I get a lot out of it and it has connected me to so many people and so many good books. I don’t feel like I’m exaggerating in saying that blogging has changed my life. It’s made me a much more stable, happy, and thoughtful person than I was before. Some of that is simply growing up because who I was at 24 when I started this blog is hardly a slice of who I am now at almost-28 writing this blog. Part of me wonders how much of it is learning about different aspects of my profession and about the book and reviewing world (two or three or four or five or more separate things all sort of co-mingling) that jades me a bit and part of me — maybe a bigger part of me — wonders about people and the straight-up human aspects of blogging and writing and engagement and how much those have influenced me in the last few months. It’s never really been a secret, for example, that authors might buy reviews of their books and it’s never really been a secret that some bloggers have preferential treatment from publishers. What has been surprising, though, is what people respond to and what sets them off.
I feel like I learned this lesson hard after the ARC discussion following ALA. Who knew something so … innocuous … could send people into such passion? Or that discussing being critical or being passionate about what you do would get people thinking and talking? Who knew that blogging about a fitness DVD could, dare I say, cause a number of people who hadn’t been working out to suddenly dive in? I love that that happened and I love thinking that maybe something I said inspired one person to try something new. That’s awesome. It really is.
But then I think back to writing reviews and books and why I wanted to start blogging in the first place. I pour my heart and soul into the reviews I do write because that’s just who I am. It’s all or nothing. Lately, it’s been nothing, and I wonder how much of it has to do with the fact I don’t know what reward I am getting out of writing them. Or maybe that’s not really it. Maybe it’s that I don’t feel writing a review of a book commands the sort of discussion or interest or passion that other posts do.
Or maybe it’s that the things I listed as having fantastic responses and engagement have made me do a lot of thinking about what I’m doing this for anyway. Is it me? I think it is. But then I wonder why I feel so discouraged when reviews sort of slide under the radar or when they’re drowned out. Maybe it’s that reading is a much more private activity? Or that it’s something so personal and individual that it can never sustain the sort of fevered discussion other topics do? Maybe it’s that other bloggers with whom I like to talk regularly don’t want to read or engage in a discussion over a book they haven’t read yet because they don’t want to be influenced (I do that).
I’m not sure I have an answer.
Anyone who knows me in real life knows this about me, too: I’m not a loud person. I never did well in the participation aspect of any class I took. I prefer to sit back and listen. I like to hear what other people say and process it at many different levels before I respond. I’m highly introverted. I love being around people but I need me time to decompress, to recollect myself, to recenter. Blogging has forced me to push outside a lot of my comfort zones. Maybe what would be surprising is that a lot of those bigger posts have made me really uncomfortable.
I love discussion and I love when people are engaged in content here and I certainly don’t want that to stop. It’s what makes blogging exciting and keeps me wanting to continue. It makes me want to look for other people who are blogging and writing and share their great things with others, too. But in a lot of those discussions, I feel like I lost a bit of myself. Of my need to refocus and recenter. Of my need to reengage with my own thoughts.
Writing reviews is that very introverted part of me. I think they’re the most intimate and raw things I do write because they come from a lot of internal vulnerabilities or thoughts I’ve had about any number of things. Part of me wonders if other people feel this way, too, and if that’s what makes writing them so difficult sometimes. If that’s why there are long periods of nothing followed by bursts of energy to review, review, review. If that’s why there’s not always much engagement with book reviews, despite how much I think one I’ve written just nails it perfectly.
It’s not about pressure for me, and it never has been nor will it ever be. It’s more about my need to dig inside myself and pull from sensitivities, from experiences I don’t always feel comfortable thinking or writing about, from all these lessons I’ve learned over the course of blogging and just growing up and becoming the person I really strive to be. There’s all and there’s nothing. And right now, there’s been a lot of nothing, but not for lack of trying or care.
At the end of the day, it’s about what I expect from my own reviewing and my own writing. The reward is self-discovery and self-gratification and feeling as though I’ve walked away from what I’m doing with my whole heart with some kind of reward. The droughts — especially ones that have dragged on as long as this one has — are painful and annoying. All I expect is to walk away feeling like I’ve done what I love doing.
Blogging is hard. Writing reviews is hard. Putting yourself out there is hard. It’s a constant struggle for how much to say and how much to hold back. It’s also about image and perception and approachability. I love when people want to reach out. But how much can I give back fairly to everyone and still hold something true to myself? I know I owe nothing to anyone expect myself, but when you’re a blogger and when you love the way people engage with you, there’s a lot of thought behind where you draw the line in the sand. And when you’re an all or nothing person, it’s tough. You want to give your all where you can, even if it means at some point you may leave yourself with nothing.
I have to keep reminding myself it’s okay. I am an imperfect person, and that is okay. There are things I don’t have to do until I feel ready to do them, and that is okay. If I declare book review bankruptcy on the things sitting in my pile because I just don’t have it in me . . . that’s okay. The only expectations and rewards required are the ones I get myself.
Maybe blogging this does the opposite of what I’m saying I want, but I share it because I have a feeling there are many bloggers — new bloggers and more seasoned bloggers — who will understand this or empathize with this right now, in the future, or have struggled with it.
We’re human.
It’s okay.
When life intervenes for me, writing reviews is the first thing that I drop from my blog, Kelly. (This isn't always immediately visible because I pre-schedule reviews.) I think that writing reviews is a creative endeavor. And when my creative juices are low, I can't do it. Lots of other food for thought in this post, too, but that's my two cents for the moment. Thanks for making me think!
I'm the same way — no one probably even knew the difference regarding reviews between May and now because I have had so many written already (and I still have a few sitting in the pool).
It feels like a lot of my creative ideas are elsewhere right now. I'd love for them to be in reviewing because there is a lot I want to review but…it's just nothing right now.
There is something in knowing other people go through this. Even for long spells.
I don't know how you do what you do, and I commend you for it. I can't speak from the book blogging perspective, but as an author, I'm feeling more and more interested in taking back a private corner of my life. For me, that means my reading.
Starting next year, I won't post on Goodreads or add to my currently reading list on my blog. As much as I love discussing books, I relish the opportunity to read only what I want (no contests, no commitments) as often as I want and whenever I want. I'm sure there will be titles I'll want to talk about. For now, though, I'm looking forward to keeping this part of my life mine alone.
I'm not entirely sure what the line between this and my private corner is. I think that's part of the struggle. Reviews are intensely personal but in a way that's different than, say, a review of a fitness DVD or a discussion of passion, etc. I like doing all of those things but wonder where my energy goes into one if it means another thing suffers. I'm not sure!
I love discussing books, which is why I blog in the first place. I don't ever see changing that. It's just a matter of figuring out a balance, of figuring out how to break through what feels like a never-ending block.
Fabulous post. <3 That is all.
Thanks
Being in a reviewing slump myself, I've come to a conclusion that I just don't feel very passionately about many books right now. Bad ones I don't even finish, good ones don't come my way much these days. So I remain in a bit of a rereading limbo:(
I have been having that experience, too, Tatiana. It's been tough getting excited about much reading lately. And actually, I think this is the first time I got a publisher's catalog for the next season and requested nothing because nothing looked like it'd be a good fit.
What I also noticed is that after reading primarily YA for about 3 years now, I am hard to please any more. Until recently I was a part of a YA book club, but it's come to the point where I've read/tried/formed an opinion about almost every book/author suggested for group reading. It's much harder now for me to find something unique and fresh.
There are other reasons why I am not very inclined to read right now, but weariness and tiredness of the same old are at the top of the list of my reasons, I think.
I admit to having a lot of those biases, too, but I think I've been having them a lot more in terms of trends in theme and genre lately. Everything sort of sounds the same to me. I want my stories to be fresh and finding that has been harder and harder.
I've been considering working harder at my to-read pile, the back list stuff, as a way of maybe pulling out some gems that have been overlooked.
I totally did buy the Shred and have been doing it for…8 days sporadically, all because of your tweets.
I am kind of jealous that you are at the point in your life where you can say that it is okay to have book review bankruptcy and that, it seems at 27ish you are comfortable with yourself. At 25 (just turned in July), I am not quite that comfortable with myself to just relax and take time off. My biggest fear blogging-wise is a dry spell. Do you think that once you are more settled in life that fear goes away? By settled in life I mean, with a career, married, having your masters, etc.
A few other things I wanted to touch on in this comment:
I thought the arc discussion after ALA had reached a point where it got really ugly. Like, I think it got totally derailed with the personal life probing.
I love that you blog with such passion, with such all or nothing. I feel like when I visit/lurk your blog, I am coming across people who are very real (if that makes sense) and very intelligent and not automatons or anything.
I also love the end of this post about struggling and being human. I can absolutely empathize.
I worry about dry-spells in blogging all the time, except it seems like when I hit that point, I can still manage to generate some sort of idea about what to write. I keep a list with me all the time of things I'm thinking about — little or big — and pull from that when I need to. I know you talked about feeling competitive with other bloggers and comparing yourself but that's one thing I don't do. By that I mean…I don't really worry about what other people are doing with their blogs, what they're reviewing (except blog tour stuff — if I see there is one going on for a book I planned to review and it's one of those long ones, I tend to not review the book and add to noise), what features they're offering.
I have no idea about the settled in life thing because there's not much different "thing" wise of the me at 25 from the me now. I've been married for 5 years, my career is actually LESS stable now than it was back then, and I've had my master's for a number of years. I don't feel like I'm settled at all. I just feel like I know myself better and the things that make me tick vs the things that give me a lot of satisfaction. I know who I trust and what I can trust them with. I'm not sure this is at all helpful because the answer is I don't feel settled at all! I just accept myself more maybe, pile of faults and all. I'm wildly imperfect and it is what it is.
& thanks. I feel like a LOT of people understand this but people don't talk about it openly. I've been thinking a lot about social media, too, and how that doesn't help any of the feelings sometimes. Even if you don't compare yourself or put pressure on yourself, you STILL DO when it comes to SM sometimes. At least I do! I feel like there's another whole post in that, too, and a post about one's online persona and their offline persona and … this is where I think sometimes the well of ideas never WILL run dry.
I was just thinking to myself that it's been months since I posted anything but book reviews, and so I've been blogging in a comment-less wasteland. I completely agree that there's not always much engagement with book reviews. And for me, it's the other stuff that's more difficult to write. I don't even write status updates on Facebook very often. I guess that makes me shy online as well as offline, though I never think of myself that way.
I have never included book reviews on my blog because I don't want reading ever to become a chore, and I'm afraid it would if I felt pressured to write about what I read. (My blog often just sounds like I'm talking to myself, because it's where I hash out my own ideas before I try them in my school library!) I do enjoy reading book reviews on others' blogs, but I rarely comment because I usually haven't read the book yet so I have nothing to contribute. Don't let the lack of comments fool you into thinking no one appreciates what you've taken the time to do. You are shaping the reading of others in ways you will never even know about!
Maybe it's that I don't feel writing a review of a book commands the sort of discussion or interest or passion that other posts do.
FWIW… I'm less likely to comment on a book review post simply because I probably haven't read the book yet. If it sounds interesting to me, I generally quietly add it to my TBR list, and that's it. Now I'm feeling a little bad about that! But truly, Kelly, I appreciate your posts, reviews or no reviews. You've got a good thing going here, and I admire it.
I get that because I do the same thing with other bloggers. The review writing is tough and has value and at the same time, it's a struggle because it's hard to gauge what value, you know? It's not about making anyone feel bad because I'm just as crummy at commenting on reviews (on a LOT of blog things, even though I read a ton of blogs). But thank you 🙂