Let’s Talk Bookish – How has blogging affected your reading?

Let’s talk bookish is a weekly meme, created and hosted by Rukky @Eternity Books and Dani @Literary Lion, here different topics will be discussed.

This week’s topic is ‘How has blogging affected your reading?’

Has blogging affected your reading in a positive or negative way? If so, how?

I would say both! There are books I would not otherwise have picked up, some of those I ended up loving, others not so much!

An example of a negative way: I recently read A Winter’s Promise by Christelle Dabos, and really did not like it..! I had decided that this book was not for me, so I would not read it. But then I kept seeing great reviews for the book, so I ended up reading it. And indeed ended up not liking it..

Another example would be Fable by Adrienne Young, which I DNF’ed. I read Sky in the Deep by her, and did not like it. So I had decided that this author was not for me. But then Fable got great reviews, so I wanted to see the hype, but once again, ended up not liking it.. So I should have listened to my gut feeling haha!

But there, of course, also have been really good examples! As a main thing I would say that I picked up New Adult Romances because of blogging. So far I have not read many, but I have been loving them! Two examples are The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren and Get a Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert. And I’m now very excited to pick up more!

Another genre I tried and ended up loving because of the blogging community are mystery/thrillers! Again I have not read that many yet, but I am really enjoying them!

Now I’m only talking about the ‘type’ of books. But when I just started blogging I felt like I needed to read a certain amount of books each month. So that I would have a long wrap up and could post many reviews each month! But I’m getting over that! Especially since this year! I’m only posting reviews for books that I feel like reviewing, or have something to say about! And if there is a day I don’t feel like reading, I just won’t! So far this year I’ve been noticing that I still read the same amount, but since I took of the stress, I do keep wanting to read, since I don’t ‘have to’!

Do you think the pressure to produce content can result in a bad relationship with books?

I kinda answered this in the previous paragraph haha! Last year I felt like I was enjoying certain books less because I ‘had to’ read a certain page count every day, which ended up in me forcing myself to read, which was not a good thing!

But this year I’m not doing that anymore! If I ‘only’ read 10 pages on a day that is fine, if I feel like reading a whole book, that is amazing!

How do you balance blogging and reading?

Since this year I have been posting less. Around 4 blog posts a week, which gives me way more time for reading!

Blog posts like this one (Let’s Talk Bookish) and Top Ten Tuesday, I write in the weekend before posting. My weekly wrap up’s I write throughout the week, just adding once I finish a book, so when I’m then about to schedule the post, it is not that much work anymore. And reviews I generally write once I finish the book or the next day or something. Meaning that during the week I don’t really write blog posts, so my evenings are for reading/watching TV.

As for reading other blog posts, I often read some in the morning before work, since  I like to start up my morning slowly, I have some time for this! And I read some after work, before I go make my dinner 🙂

Do you think you would have started blogging if it weren’t for books or vice versa?

I wouldn’t know what to blog about  besides books.. so no haha!

Has blogging affected your reading? If yes, in what way?