Monday, November 21, 2011

Musing Monday...Thanks a Lot Guys.

Let me put on my thinking cap and check out this weeks Musing Monday from MizB at Should Be Reading ...


How do you decide to read a book by an author you haven’t read before? What sort of recommendations count most highly in making that decision?

Honestly, I have so many books to read by authors I know, it takes some motivation to pick upon something by an unknown writer.
But a strong recommendation and an interesting sounding plot can convince me.
Ok, maybe it is not really that hard.
Without question, the number one source of those recommendations would be my fellow bloggers.
And over time I have developed a small group of bloggers whose tastes I think are most like mine and whose opinions I take more seriously.
What did I do before I started blogging and reading blogs? Oh yes, I remember. I did not have hundreds of books in my To Be Read pile and had to actually 'find' a next book to read.
Yeah, thanks a lot guys.
A whole, huge TBR pile of thanks. ;-)

But a certain percentage of recommendations come from other sources still. The NY Times Book Reviews is one I still read and often pick up some interesting 'new-to-me' authors. On occasion, in the past, I used to find new authors in other publications..People magazine, Newsweek, the Philadelphia Inquirer...but to tell ya the truth I don't read any of those publications anymore. So many book, so little time. Who has time to read the news?!

There are a few new sources to make up for them, some I am sure a number of you are familiar with. Shelf Awareness, is one. I click on one of those ads,  maybe there is a little video, some blurbs from other authors and before you know it, I am hooked. Library Thing Early Reviewers is another. Ever month thousands of couple of a whole pile of books are offered. So of course, if you are going to request any, you have to read all the descriptions. At best, you may win one book, but now I have found so many more I wish I could read and a few I will just have to buy, usually by author that I did not know before.

So some of you may ask why am I even trying to get another book from Early Reviewers or an ARC offered on Shelf Awareness? Don't I have enough?
What does that have to do with anything??
Because I want the newest. I will admit it..it is so cool to be reading a book that is not even out yet, whether it is by an author I love or someone new and fresh to me
Because it is a sickness folks, an addiction.
But not that bad an addiction as addictions goes.

Or so I tell myself. :-)

16 comments:

  1. i had a dream i got locked in a library at night and it was creepy and weird. the librarian was some kind of zombie.

    if thats not some kind of sickness idk what is.

    ReplyDelete
  2. it was the northfield library...i havent been there in years.

    ReplyDelete
  3. So true..addictions that make us smarter, well at least some of the addictions. Addicted to the cute challenge buttons don't fall in that category but new books, most definitely.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh, yes, Shelf Awareness is awesome :)

    Here's mine:
    http://carabosseslibrary.blogspot.com/2011/11/musing-mondays_21.html

    ReplyDelete
  5. Reading your entry, I realised in my own I left out the only publication that I use for recommendations - a magazine called newbooks - the only one I honestly have the patience to go through! I'll sometimes also browse online The Guardian.

    ReplyDelete
  6. You certainly do your share of adding to other people's reading lists, so it's only fair we do it to you too. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  7. I still get my books the old fashion way, I buy mine. I don't like the pressure of thinking I have to read a book and review it. My addiction is... I have trouble going in a bookstore and coming out empty handed, it never happens!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I myself just finished The Informationist because of none other than you!

    ReplyDelete
  9. LT . . ."at best, you might win one'

    Yeah, the real best is when you actually GET the book! I still have not received Lisa Unger's book. Did you?

    ReplyDelete
  10. I get recommendations from everywhere, but mainly from other bloggers.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Getting recommendations is very helpful. I certainly keeps my TBR list going, that's for sure! :)

    ReplyDelete
  12. Blogging broke my reading life wide open and exposed me to authors and books I would have never read. What a glorious thing!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Hello! Thanks for the visit to my blog!

    "...But not that bad an addiction as addictions goes."

    Yup, it isn't a bad addiction. Let's keep telling ourselves that! ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  14. I just recently started getting emails from Shelf Awareness, and am loving them.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Before the whole book blogging world, I only had maybe 1 or 2 books on my TBR- pile, if even that. Now, I have 300+ books in it. Yeah, thanks a lot! :D

    ReplyDelete
  16. This is such a good addiction to have. LOL! I have found new authors to be surprisingly good and I did enjoyed a few of them.

    ReplyDelete

please speak up, I LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU!!