These are
how I do my blogging stuffs:
A good book
or book that emotionally moved me usually fills my head as soon as I finish it.
For this kind of books I must write the review right away, or else the emotion
would evaporate from me, and in the end my review would be flat and plain. So, if
you happen to read a very intense and emotional review in my blog, you can bet
that I wrote it when the idea is still warm in me, and I liked the book!
I can write
a review at home on weekend, but I often do it at the office, when I don’t have
any engaging job to do (again…Love you Boss, for ignoring my taking office
hours to blog!).
To write a
review, I would make sure I have the book around me, in case I forget a name or
a place, or want to find a certain passage or quote. If I don’t have the book
on hand, I’d better postpone the review, because to write partly would ruin the
mood.
As the
internet connection is not always good to me, I don’t like to spend too much
time in composing new posts on Blogger dashboard. So, I usually prepare my post
from MS Word. I would properly arrange every paragraph, check spellings, put certain
sentences on italic or bold, prepare images (download or scan, and save). After
that I would copy and paste the whole text into the new post board. Then I
might add images, set the quotation, and add links. This way, I don’t have to
take a long time to re-arrange it while on Blogger dashboard.
I ALWAYS put
at least one related image in my posts. Who don’t like images? And I think
images attract people more than words :).
In
reviewing, I follow my own rule, which is…no rule! I like to call it my free
style :). I don’t set myself to always put a short synopsis in review, or things
like that. I just open a new document in MS Word, and voila…I just type in what
pops up in my head. I follow my intuition, or rather, the flow of my mind.
Sometimes I start a review with a beautiful or thought provoking quote;
sometimes I write the general outline of the story in two or three sentences;
but sometimes I can just go into my thoughts of it, and then explaining the ‘why’.
For detective-mystery books, I put spoiler alerts, but other than that—like Ruth
put it—I have no qualms about spoiling the plot. Because for me, I don’t write
reviews to provide information for others in the first place; I do it to
express my thoughts on the book I have read, as if reading is an experience,
and making a review is like capturing the moment in photos or videos.
I always
include my rating for each book I review, usually at the end of the post.
I treat my
blog as my online home; that’s why I spend a lot of time to pick a template and
arrange the layout and widgets. I don’t like to change it every other time,
because once I have fallen in love with the blog, I’ll treat it like home, and
I need to be familiar with it.
I sometimes
post my thoughts (outside a review) when I’m reading an interesting
book. When I’m in the mood to reproach an annoying character, or I’m inclined
to tell a certain character what he/she must have reacted, I would jot it down in
a post.
I also like
to do memes… :)
To make things
neat, I put the book title as one of the tags (labels) in every post
(concerning certain books). So, if I (or rather you, the readers) want to find
all my thoughts about, for example, The Portrait of A Lady, you can click ‘The Portrait of A Lady’ tag ,
and everything about that book would appear in your screen. I put the tag URL
in ‘The Classics Club Project’ list.
I try to
open my blog every day, at least to check new updates from others in my blog
roll.
I try to
always reply every comment, as I believe blog is as our own home. When you have
guests, you’re obliged to offer them warmth and hospitality by reacting when
they want to talk to you. Anyway, I always write from my heart, so my blog is
actually my own self. My blog is my way of communicating to you of how I think
about books! :)
So….do you
share any similar blogging quirks?
~~~~~~~
The rest 14 days of the challenge:
Day 3 - Blogging BFFs
Day 4 - Last Book I Didn't Finish
Day 5 - A Tear-Jerker
Day 6 - How I Shop for Books
Day 8 - 15 Things Appeals to Me on Blogs
Day 9 - Why I Blog About Books
Day 4 - Last Book I Didn't Finish
Day 5 - A Tear-Jerker
Day 6 - How I Shop for Books
Day 8 - 15 Things Appeals to Me on Blogs
Day 9 - Why I Blog About Books
Day 10 - Choosing Books To Read Next
Day 11 - Five of My Best Blog Posts
Day 12 - Blogger Fatigue? Never!
Day 13 - Underappreciated Classis Everyone Should Read
I do! I prefer to work in Word first, then cut and paste, AND I really like to add a picture related to the post.
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