Monday, October 1, 2012

Goodreads

I like Goodreads. I've meant to keep a journal of books I read for the longest time, but I usually don't get beyond a page or so before I misplace the notebook, or start using it for to-do lists, or find four-year-old watercolor renditions of volcano lava chasing wolves on top of my notes. So Goodreads lets me keep track of what I've read, and roughly how well I like it. This is good. As a reader, I give three stars to books that I finished but don't want to reread, four stars to books I really liked, and five stars to books that I loved to the point of needing to own them forever.

There are two star and one star books. Hopefully I put them down before I finished them. If I didn't, I would feel annoyed with myself.

Anyway, all of this is my confused way of saying: as a reader, I like Goodreads.

But as a writer, it's sort of scary.

You get to see who loved what you wrote and who didn't, and no matter how awesome your book is, some people won't like it. Many of the negative reviews will have valid points. Some won't. Its all part of being brave and publishing, though, and I'm so, so grateful for the authors who publish. Because reading is my favorite! And I've only read super-good books recently, so I am happy with the reading world.

I'm glad I blogged today. I almost forgot to renew my library books! I shall go and do that now...


4 comments:

  1. I like Goodreads as well. Typically, I interact with several of my connections on there. Funny, but I have one friend whom I really don't know and yet we exchange messages 3 times a week on average. Moreover, it started as a fun message about the Apocalypse and since then (it's been 2 months now) we have written messages back to one another in character. Coolio.

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    1. I love the apocalyptic in-character messages! I've read a couple of books by Patricia Wrede and a friend who wrote letters to each other, and I really enjoyed the difference in the voices. If you ever publish a dystopian novel correspondence, now I'll know where it's from. :)

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  2. I've signed up for goodreads twice now and honestly, while I like the concept, it more often than not feels like one more thing I have to take care of so then I never really go back. I've thought about getting one of the Moleskin Reading Journals - I have the recipe and garden ones (I use the recipe one the most) and I really like them. Maybe it's a tactile thing - I like the feel of actually writing my thoughts on paper. If I were published, I don't think I could bring myself to read the reviews on goodreads - too nerve-wrecking I think!

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    1. You have recipe journals? And gardening journals? That's awesome! I love the feel of Moleskin, and the scratch of a sharp pen on paper, so I completely get where you're coming from. Maybe when I don't have so many small children with markers I can get real journals, too!

      And I agree about reading the reviews--yikes!

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