Monday, June 15, 2009

Vlog: Why Read Book Blogs?

When Trish of Hey Lady and Natasha of Maw Books were in LA for the Festival of Books, we recorded a few vlogs. The first one we already shared was a brief recap of our time at the Festival of Books, but we thought it would be fun to do a discussion of some other issues.

The past couple of weeks there has been a lot of discussion about the various types of blogs that cover books. To be completely honest, while I had some idea of the more journalistic blogs and even read some of them (to be honest, I probably thought they were actual newspaper blogs in my mind somehow) when I think book blogs I think of the community of people who read books and talk about them in a fashion similar to the myself and the two other ladies in this blog.

We decided to talk about why people should read book blogs and I have to admit watching it now shows how incredibly rooted we are in the idea of blogs as conversations and communities. Please keep in mind this was recorded in April and none of these other conversations had come up yet. We do come out swinging a little bit against newspaper reviews, but from my perspective, I can tell you that's a defensive attitude taken and not an offensive one. I never even thought to mention newspaper reviews in a conversation about book blogs until they did first.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy!! And I've said it before but I'll say it again...thanks for letting me talk about books with you!













Amy

11 comments:

Rel said...

Fun, fun, girls :) Thanks for sharing - great to see you almost in the flesh, so to speak!

Sandy Nawrot said...

I remember Natasha posting vlogs of the three of you...so good to see you in real life! I whole-heartedly agree with all of you. I don't have a degree in literature and I tend to write like I talk, which is why I will probably never write reviews for a publication. But I also doubt that anyone will find my reviews boring either! The popularity of book blogs are spreading and is so encouraging. I think probably half of my readers are non-bloggers that just love to read and want recommendations. The book blogging community I believe is unique, and something I did not appreciate when I started out! Great post!

Meghan said...

I love the video! I have to say, I have a degree in literature but I don't think it reflects in my reviews one bit in terms of literary analysis, and I prefer it that way. That's not what I am after here. You're all totally right in that book blogging is a conversation. I love looking up reviews after finishing a book and writing my own. I love the community, that's what it is all about for me. Fantastic video, ladies!

bermudaonion said...

I love book blogs, too, and I definitely get all of my recommendations from them now.

Anonymous said...

Great vlog! I love reading all 3 of your blogs. I'm relatively new to the blogging world and one thing it seems to me is that a lot of you all seem to know each other really well already. Do you think it's harder for new bloggers to jump into the mix?

Danish Accent said...

67% of the readers get their book info from literary blogs. Let's face it, you're here to stay, and publishers and writers like myself are becoming aware of that, so keep up the good work!

Heidenkind said...

I like Trish's t-shirt. :)

Nice vlog--hopefully we'll be able to get more fun you in the future.

Sandy Nawrot said...

Just a comment to Debbie...I am a new blogger. I just started last November. It was quite noticeable when I started that everyone seemed to know each other already, but as I barged into the middle of everything, it was pretty easy to blend. The key for me was just doing alot of socializing, getting involved in "offline" e-mail discussions, doing blogger interviews, and generally being kind and courteous, like everyone else out there in this wonderful community! It is the friendliest place I've ever experienced!

Serena said...

I saw this on Maw Books as well and I really love the video and I think your right..it is a community and I think that we can tackle anything as long as the support system is in place to help each one of us.

Michelle said...

Look at you lovely ladies! I have to say I think adding the vlog to the mix is a wonderful way to further personalize and create that community/relationship with your readers. Excellent job!

I've come to the online world in search of that community and book bloggers have it in spades. I've been made to feel welcome and embraced as a valuable contributor both of which aren't always the case in any community. I think this is why I prefer to frequent more book blogs as compared to other more traditional print based resources.

Teddy Rose said...

I just saw this on Hey Lady. I love it when the three of you get together. Thanks for representing our book blog community!

Post a Comment

Thank you for taking the time to comment! I appreciate hearing your thoughts.