On tips and tricks for better blogging

Someday, I'll write my own guide to being a new blogger (which we already talked about a bit for The Bibliotaph's birthday). Right now, though, I need a little more experience to be superhelpful to bloggers everywhere. In the meantime, here are some helpful guides to being a new blogger and how to start on the right foot.

• Avalinah's Book #NewBloggers 101 Guide - This series of posts on various aspects of being a blogger (and how to do things right) is being worked on by a handful of very experienced book bloggers. Covering topics from the importance of scheduling posts to getting more comments, from knowing where to request books from to writing a review policy for your blog, their goal is to cover every aspect of blogging in order to help book bloggers everywhere. It's in-depth, it's immensely helpful, and the bloggers working on this series are so kind and sweet. This is the first place I would recommend reading when you're starting a book blog.
• PaperFury- Cait from PaperFury is a blogging with LOTS of experience. She's got a lot of good stuff to say. Her posts with tips are a little harder to track down since she does it infrequently. To start, here is her post on getting people to read your blog. She also has two (yes, two) lovely posts on getting more comments (see here and here). And here is another post on thinking of good discussion posts! PaperFury has a depth of experience (and HUNDRED of posts), so dig a little deeper for even more blog tips.
• Book blogging ideas - There are so many places to get blogging post ideas, but this post by the PJV is a helpful start. Here on the Bibliotaph, I also have a list of A-Z blogging topics that are a good jumping off point.

These are the resources that I most recommend for starting bloggers. What other posts would you recommend new bloggers check out? What helped you when you were starting?

Happy 1st Birthday, The Bibliotaph!

This month marks one year since The Bibliotaph began and what an exciting year it's been! I've learned so much about books, the blogging community, and my own tastes since starting (and I'm so excited that I've followed through on a project for this long). In honor of this one year anniversary, I'd like to share a few lessons I've learned this year:

• Be mindful about how many books you request on Netgalley - This has been one of the biggest and most painful lessons this year. I requested WAY too many books and got approved for far more of them than I thought a new blogger could be. It was intimidating and I still have a ton of books to catch up on. But I've learned my lesson - I currently have 5 books approved that are coming up in the next few months and I refuse to request any more until I finish most of those. 
• Taking a hiatus is a okay - Over the holidays in December, I simply forgot that I didn't have very many posts queued up. Once I came back at the end of the year, I was horrified to learn that I'd had two weeks without any posts - how had I let this happen? Had finals and holidays occupied my time so much that I couldn't even post something about taking a hiatus? But it was okay - I got back into the groove of posting and missing those two weeks didn't kill my blog. It turned out alright. Learning this means I'll be more mindful about taking breaks in the future - especially during times when I know I won't be able to give the blog my full attention.
• Don't worry about posting every day - When I originally started, I felt like I was bursting with post ideas and I was excited to post as often as possible. I had months of material queued up when I realized that I was starting to run out of ideas and that blogging might be more difficult than I'd thought. It also took me some time to realize that posting several times a week was fun, but so much work - way too much work for a student. I started this year with posting twice a week (and occasionally throwing in blogging meme posts) and it's been so much easier to keep up with.
• Blogging memes are lifesavers - I didn't fully understand this until a couple months ago. When I started (and when I was full of ideas), I felt like blogging memes were kind of lazy - it was just bloggers working off of each other's ideas. Now, I feel differently. Blogging memes help me to connect with other bloggers and get an extra post or two in when I haven't had time to work on a full post. Also, it's fun to have short posts about what I'm currently reading and the music I'm into lately - they're easier for casual blog readers to connect with and comment on. And they're so much fun to think about.

I'm so excited that I get to apply these lessons in my next year of blogging! As part of this next year, I'm going to be testing out redoing past blog posts by discussing how my opinions differ after a year and what new books I would add to various book lists. I'm looking forward to this new part of my blogging adventures and thank you for taking part in them!

What blogging lessons have you learned in your time as a blogger? What's been the biggest lesson you'd want to pass on to less-experienced bloggers? How long have you been blogging?

On getting books to review

When I first started off as a blogger, it was difficult for me to figure out how to find books to review (besides the extremely popular ones at the library that I had to wait forever to get or buy with my limited student budget). I’ve learned a bit in my almost-year of blogging and I’m excited to share with you some ways I’ve received books to review!

• Goodreads Giveaways - When I first started off blogging, winning a couple Giveaways made a huge difference in giving me interesting and unique material to read and discuss on my blog. Some of the books were terrible and some weren’t memorable in the least. But a lot were unique books that I wouldn’t have read otherwise. I previously wrote about winning Goodreads Giveaways here.
• Other blogs - I’ve often won books off giveaways on other blogs. Books featured on other blogs are typically reasonably popular (good for getting more blog views) and also tend to be new books, so good to look at before they are made available to the general public. Most blogs hold Giveaways periodically, but Fantasy Literature and Jean BookNerd are two blogs that hold LOTS of giveaways that are not too difficult to win periodically.
• Netgalley - This is the bread and butter of book reviewing. Netgalley is a great way to get new books and to spread the word about your blog a bit. A couple tips:
• Don’t request 10 billion books right off the bat - My initial mistake was requesting every book I could see. Once I actually was approved for a lot of these books, I had way too much to read in a reasonable amount of time. Take it slowly - request a book a week or even less if that’s too much for you.
• Balance Netgalley books with things you want to read for fun - When I initially requested every Netgalley book I could find, it was fun to read things I might not have picked up otherwise and I loved being one of the first people to review these books. It got a little old when I read 5 Netgalley books in a row and didn’t enjoy any of them. It was wonderful to return to a book I was actually excited to read. I’ve found that I get through Netgalley books better if I also read things I’m interested in - not all Netgalley books are good or interesting.

How do you find books to review for your blog? What helps you broaden your bookish horizons?

On the A-Z of book blogging topics

At a loss for topics to blog about? Here are several topics that I’ve brainstormed that you can blog about. Hopefully this will help you in your future blogging adventures!

Activism

Adaptations

Advice

Age

Animals

Anxiety

ARCs

Audiobooks

Authors

Biographies

Blogging

Blogging schedules

Bookbinding

Book clubs

Book deals

Book industry

Bookmarks

Book sellers

Bookshelves

Book signings

Bookstores

Book tours

Borrowing books

Bucket list

Business

Buying books

Characters

Cheap books

Chick lit

Children

Classics

Comedy

Comics

Controversy

Covers

Current events

Currently reading

Debate

Dedications

Depression

Diversity

Drama

Dramedy

Ebooks vs. paper books

Ending

Epilogues

Expense of books

Family

Fanfiction

Fantasy

Fiction vs. nonfiction

Films

Finding time to read

Food

Free books vs. purchased books

Friends

Gender

Gift guide

Giveaways

Goodreads

Graphic novels

Guest posts

History

Hobbies

Holidays

Horror

How to’s

• Interview an author
• Get more viewers on your blog
• Stay motivated to blog
• Read more diverse books
• Get better book recommendations
• Connect with other book bloggers
• Get a guest poster on your blog
• Get advanced copies of books

Humor

Interviewing authors

Interviewing other bloggers

Learning

Lending books

Length

Libraries

Library cards

Lists

Main Characters

Memoir

Mental Health

Middle Grade

Music

Mystery

Myth vs. Fact

Netgalley

News

Non-fiction

Open letter

Parody

Philosophy

Pinterest

Podcasts

Publishing

Quotes

Readalikes

Reading for school

Reading for work

Religion

Rereading

Review

Romance

School

Science Fiction

Seasons

Series

Setting

Splurging

Standalone

Statistics

Stealing books

Supporting characters

Symbolism

TBR

Teaching

Things to buy

Thriller

Top Ten lists

Travel

Trends

Tropes

Unpopular opinions

Upcoming books

Urban fantasy

Video blogs

Villains

Writing

Working with bloggers

YA

What topics would you add to this list? What resources do you use to come up with new blogging topics?

On beginning to read as a blogger

It’s now been about 7 months since I began my blogging adventure and things have certainly changed. For one, I’ve found that it’s harder to write interesting posts than I thought it would be. It’s also difficult to keep up a steady stream of ideas and plans and blogging schedules. The biggest change I’ve found, however, is in the way I read. For me, reading used to be how I’d spend my leisure time. In recent months (even before I started blogging), I found that I was getting more serious about reading, that I wanted to devour every book in existence, that reading a couple books in a month wasn’t really enough.

Blogging changed things more. I started to feel an obligation to read, to broaden my reading horizons, to start reading deeper in some genres so I could have more interesting and more diverse and varied books to write about and to include in my blog posts.

My reading choices weren’t the only thing that changed - the way I read had been altered tremendously. Reading with a purpose is much different from reading for fun for a lot of reasons.

• I read more analytically - Instead of finishing a book and saying, “Well, that was fun. On to the next one!” I like to think about what made the book good, whether I’m glad I read it, what sort of audience I would recommend it to, how it could have been made better, what parts were clunky and needed changing, etc. It’s been enlightening to read like this and I’ve discovered more of my personal tastes and what I want out of a book. I’ve also found a lot of things that I don’t like in books (i.e. love triangles - bleh).
• I choose different sorts of books - Like I stated above, reading with a purpose makes me want to read more broadly. I want to have an overall idea of what’s going on in each genre, what’s currently popular, who the big authors currently are. It’s been fascinating to learn this about many genres that I’m not well-acquainted with and fun to try finding new books within each genre.
• I read more deeply - While I’m trying to read broadly, I’m also trying to focus in on a few specific genres. Right now, for instance, I’m working on reading more science fiction so that I can have a better idea of what works in that genre and how talented sci-fi authors write. I’ve learned that I really enjoy gritty science fiction and that there are some really cliched sub-genres within science fiction, so it’s been a fantastic learning experience. This has also given me a TON of new and unique books to mention on my blog and more chances to write about sci-fi. It’s also helping me as I work (slowly) on writing a sci-fi book of my own.
• I think about my review as I’m reading - While I’m not strictly a reviewer, I’m constantly thinking about my future reviews as I write. Sometimes, a quote will stand out and I’ll make a mental note to mention it in my review. Or I’ll notice a subplot that’s more confusing than helpful and I’ll remind myself to reflect more on that when I write my review. I’ll often have the review half written while I still have the last several chapters to go.
• Books I read will inspire blog posts - I’ll often read a book that gets me thinking and inspires a blog post about sections of the book or about similar stories. For example, reading Women at Church by Neylan McBaine got me thinking about lots of other books for Mormons - leading to posts on the topic (here and here)

Has blogging or writing reviews changed the way you read? How do you find inspiration from books you love? How does writing about reading change the sorts of books you choose to read?

On how to keep up with your blog when your life gets crazy

Blogging is a pretty serious time and energy commitment and it can be really tough to prioritize your blogging over everything else in your life - especially when things like work and family and your sanity are probably more important. When work heats up or when there’s a family trip to go on, blogging can fall by the wayside. But I have some tips for you for keeping up with your blog when you know your life is about to get crazy (or to prepare for those unexpected crazy times).

1. Write a few weeks worth of material and schedule it - I tend to do this most of the time because I never know what’s going to happen in my life. I try to keep a couple weeks ahead on my blog posts (at least - as I write this, I’m three months ahead on my scheduled posts - because I know my life is about to get wild). That way, even if I forget that I’m supposed to post something, I can know that something will go up and I’ll have at least a couple weeks to get caught up, get my life back under control, or to give myself a much-needed break.
2. Write in big chunks - If your life is perpetually busy, then this may be a better option for you (or you can combine it with the above option). Take some time on a day you typically aren’t busy and set aside a couple hours to write your next week (or month) of blog posts. If you are really productive, you can partially write a handful of posts and come back to them with fresh eyes the next time you have a few hours to write. Writing in big chunks can help you separate your crazy personal life with your blogging life.
3. Keep a few link round-ups on hand just in case - This is something I do every now and then when I’m feeling stressed. Link round-ups are pretty quick to write and can be really fun and interesting if you pick a good topic. I like to keep a folder of finished blog posts that I can throw up if I need to post something quickly and don’t have time to dedicate hours to writing. Obviously, this isn’t something you can use for every blog post, but it helps for those random weeks where you are too busy to blog as much as you want to.
4. Invite someone else to blog for you - If you have a good friend with knowledge about your blogging topic, they may be just the person to take over during your month-long tour of Europe. It may also give you an opportunity to find a blogging partner - which makes things a lot easier (less posts for you to write and come up with while still getting the same amount of material out). Also, this could give your blog a chance to appeal to different sorts of people within your blogging topic - which could equal more readers. You could even combine this idea with suggestion #1 and have scheduled posts from you alternate with new posts from your friend.
5. Take a break - If blogging is difficult for you to keep up on long term, this may be your best option. There’s nothing wrong with taking some time off to get your life in order or to finish something that’s important to you. Bloggers do it all the time.

How do you keep up with your blog when things get busy? Have you tried any of the above suggestions?

On my blogging routine

As someone who is still relatively new to blogging, I don’t have all the answers. I don’t even know what half the questions are at this point. But I have learned quite a bit in my time blogging and I’ve settled into a routine, which I would like to share with you today. So here we go - this is the evolution of each post I write.

Step 1 - I come up with an idea/title, make a new document on Google Drive, make a few quick notes about my thoughts, and save it. Often, I’ll have an idea at a time when I’m not able to sit down and actually write everything, so I just jot it down to work on later.

Step 2- Typically, Loverboy and I devote our Tuesday evenings to working on our individual hobbies. I usually read, knit, or blog while he programs. On my blogging nights, I browse through my possible ideas in my Google Drive and find one that catches my eye.

Step 3- I glance over the notes and begin writing a rough draft (during this step is also when I do my initial research for more in-depth posts).

Step 4- I return to the document several times over the next couple weeks (on another blogging night or just when I have twenty minutes to spare) to finish it and to make sure it looks good.

(Optional step) - I sometimes have someone glance over my blog post if I’m unsure about some aspects of it. Or, I’ll read it out loud a couple times to make sure it works.

Step 5 - I move the document into my “Ready to Post” folder until I feel like it’s time to post it.

Step 6- I look over the blog post one last time before scheduling it on my blog, adding in pictures and links, and making last minute additions and edits.

Step 7- Blog post goes up!

My process isn’t perfect and some blog posts don’t follow this exactly, but it’s a good routine for me to follow and it’s turned out some decent blog posts that I’ve had a lot of fun writing.

How does your blogging routine differ? How is it similar? Are there any blogging questions or concerns that are burning up your head?