The momentum of Book Blogger Appreciation Week wasn’t sustained in my blogging last week, sadly–I only got one post up and am officially behind on review-writing. I fell off the comment wagon (although I have saved some posts with the intent to comment, and may yet get to them this weekend!)

 

I have been doing some online reading outside some of my usual haunts, though, and wanted to share a few links with y’all today, with thanks to everyone who shared them where I could find them!

But first, a couple of PSA’s…

Book Bloggers: These Things Are Happening!

The Armchair Audies need category judges! (I was thinking about throwing my hat into the ring, but I’ve been too busy with other things to get to it, which probably means it’s best if I don’t right now.)

Book Bloggers Going to BEA (Chicago, May 11-14) have a Facebook group! This is an informal place to ask questions, share tips, and plan meetups with people you’d like to spend time with during Book Expo–if you’re planning to be there, and you’re on Facebook, come join us! Thanks to my once-and-future BEA roomie Kim for setting this up…and if you know a good place to create a group like this for people who aren’t on FB, let us know!

I’m not sure those days have arrived yet.

Recent Online Reading, Mostly NOT from Book Blogs

Blogging conferences and conventions like Book Expo America are often the first time that people who have become friends in the online space meet face-to-face. If that’s a new thing for you, Two Bossy Dames have some advice on bridging the digital divide into the offline world:

“The first thing of note about your situation is that 90% of your work is already done. First, your social media relationships with these women are mutual, and active. They follow you back, and you all interact regularly. Odds are, in that case, that everyone is just waiting for one person to be brave enough to bridge the Digital Divide so that you can all begin acting in the real world the same way you already act online– like friends.”

And related: a bonus from the Dames‘ newsletter this week, Judge John Hodgman’s Principles of Friendship:

1. Try to be around people who make you genuinely feel happy and not anxious or weird or sad or whatever
2. Gently disengage from people who make you feel bad and don’t care at all about how you feel and don’t care about those people anymore
3. Do more favors than you ask for
4. Remember, it always hurts to ask
5. Let people know when you are genuinely thinking nice things about them
6. But be alert to the more frequent times when you are not thinking about anyone but yourself at all and then remember that we’re all like this, we’re all mostly thinking about ourselves, so if someone lets you down, let them off the hook. You’re letting plenty of people down all the time in small and big ways and it’s just how it goes being an individual human being
7. Don’t sit on the same side of the booth at a restaurant, even if you’re lovers
8. Don’t leave a lot of voicemails
9. Please don’t write long emails
10. ​And be nice– that’s all you need to do.

(If you take nothing else from this post, take that and run with it. I intend to.)

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In the never ending discussion of “who are we doing this for?” BlogHer co-founder Jory Des Jardins elaborates on “Why Mommybloggers Are Not Magic Beans“:

“Influence is a complicated business; everybody has a different definition of win-win. What IS worth her time varies by influencer, but a good place to start is to look at how you might help her continue to do what she loves — create content.”

In a similar vein, this post elaborating on a key concept in blogger/brand relations was shared in the Book Bloggers Do It Better Facebook group this week.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: As a book blogger, you are an influencer. If you’re getting books from publishers and talking about them online, these things apply to you.

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And from the world outside the blogiverse…

“We’re now at a point in which normal political conversation has broken down. People feel unheard, which makes them shout even louder, which further destroys conversation.” The problem with modern politics is that it’s antipolitics.

“(P)articipating in a movement seeking justice, positive reform, and empowerment is one of the most Christ-like things we can do.” I don’t think Christian beliefs are a prerequisite for practicing social justice, but I do think practicing social justice should be a huge component in living those beliefs

I come from a Christian tradition that’s never been big on actually reading the Bible at all, let alone reading it as literally true and correct. Some who come from traditions that have read it that way aren’t so sure about it anymore.

“Generation X gave you Google and Twitter and blogging; Run DMC and Radiohead and Nirvana and Notorious B.I.G. Not that it gets any credit.” 

And I’m kind of with April on this–I don’t really get adult coloring books either.

Enjoy your weekend–hope you’re reading something good!

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