Ask any book blogger what their favorite part of blogging is and nine out of ten of them will say the community. But I feel as though the community is something that bloggers happen upon unexpectedly, as a surprise perk. It makes me wonder what reasons people start blogging at all.
When it comes to me, I have a couple of reasons for continuing blogging after all these months.
1) I blog to find new books.
Before becoming a blogger, I’d walk into a bookstore and browse for hours for something that I thought appealed to me just right. Nowadays, I can walk into Barnes & Noble and recognize every book I see in the YA section, as well as knowing what it’s about and what my friends thought of it. It really makes the process of finding a book much easier.
2) I blog out of laziness.
This is the case when it comes to hype. It may be bad of me, but I simply don’t have the time to sort through a million books to find a good one. Reading books that are hyped by bloggers garuntees me a book that is, at the least, well written. Some of my favorite books have been hyped.
3) And yes, I blog for the community.
That’s pretty much a given once you start. I was not expecting the blogging community to be so chipper and kind when I started, but now I don’t think I could blog without the community. I mean, what would be the point?
But is there more to blogging than that? Until a little while ago, these three reasons for blogging would have been the only ones I needed, until a fellow blogger asked me the question, “Don’t you feel a duty as a blogger to reveal lesser-known novels?” At first, it sounded ridiculous. I blog for me, not for the authors. They sometimes benefit from my blogging, and I benefit from their ARCs, so why would it by my duty to do anything else for them? (Gah, it sounds selfish when I type it out like that.)
But then I thought of Monsters of Men. My absolute favorite series, the Chaos Walking series by Patrick Ness, wasn’t hyped. I have no clue why, as I thought it was absolutely amazing, but it seemed to slip under the radar of blog hype, which is a sad thing because it is by far the most amazing thing I’ve ever read. And it’s YA! A lot of people have heard of Patrick Ness, sure, but I know a lot that wouldn’t read his books because they only read hype. And sadly, I usually fall into that category when it comes to other authors. Is there a gigantic world of amazing books we’re missing out on out there because we’re all busy reading the same fluffy things?
Maybe there is. And although I don’t like the idea of sorting through a bunch of books I don’t like when I can just pick up a hype book, maybe it’s about time to read something new. After all, if you’re a blogger of my genre, you’ve heard of A Court of Thorns and Roses. You’ve decided already whether or not you’re going to read it if you haven’t already, I’m sure, and reading my review on it does absolutely nothing for you. But you HAVEN’T heard of Future Winds. And if I can convince one person to read a book they’d love but otherwise not notice, wouldn’t that be worth it? Isn’t that why we blog at all?
Anyways, this one’s dragging on a bit, so I’ll turn it over to you. What do you think? Why do you blog? Do you think bloggers have any sort of duty to reveal good books to the world? Drop your thoughts in the comments section!
Danni Mae 
YESSS To the finding new books. I literally walk into the store with a knowledge of everything ~ my friends drag me along instead of asking the employees. And attention to lesser known books is a big part – although it works for and against a book, if we are being honest.
I also think that mediums like WP allow people to set up free blogs for a lot less ~ that’s a big part of why Faith and I started.
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It’s just sad to me that you could recommend a book to the end of the moon, but bloggers would only get it if they saw it on several blogs. There are some exceptions, but they always go on a back burner. Unless it’s a real-life friend, like what you have
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IKR Wouldn’t it be great if people were more adventurous? I think a part of the problem is that a lot of the bloggers buy the books, so they want to make sure that something is worth the money. I’m glad I have the largest public library system in North America XD It makes reading anything and everything easier!
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Wow, how lucky! My library isn’t too good. Oh.. and the librarians have no clue what they’re doing! Now I kinda avoid the place because I don’t want them to recognize me and recommend books I don’t want D:
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Ooh, I totally agree with this. It is so much easier to read all the books recommended by other bloggers, and it’s so nice to be able to recognize most or all of the books in the YA section. But it’s also nice to strike a balance. I probably don’t do all that well, but I do try to review a decent amount of relatively obscure books, like The Knife of Never Letting Go and Imaginary Girls, because it’s always nice to add something new to the mix. It can be a little demoralizing to realize that nobody is hugely invested in my opinion on hyped books. So it’s nice to know I can create more of a voice for myself by being the first in my circle to review a lesser-known book. 😛
Thanks for sharing! 🙂
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It’s good to strike just a little bit of a balance! Sadly, I almost never hear of a book only once when it comes to blogging- there are very few! I’ve even heard of Imaginary Girls
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