Monday, June 17, 2013

2 Year Blogoversary

Two years ago today, I posted my first review. I don't know what I was expecting out of this when I sat down to start this blog. I do know it's gone through several stages and it's meant something different to me at different points. Two years ago, I had just returned from a year in Spain and was living back at home in Northern Minnesota. Since then I've lived in St. Louis teaching Freshman composition and I took time off from my grad program and moved back home. I've gone to Denver to attend the Denver Publishing Institute and then moved to New York to work in publishing. Seriously, these last two years have been crazy.

And, as always, books are the common thread through all the different places I've lived and paths I've been down. I've met a lot of wonderful bloggers and authors and other bookish people over these last two years. The first year was a lot of figuring out this blogging thing and cultivating my own little space to talk about books. This last year has seen a lot of changes, both in my life and in my blog. I've had the lovely Caralyn guest blogging she did a wonderful job keeping things running while I was at the Publishing Institute. Then in the last couple months, I've taken on a co-blogger, Jackie, who's been posting fabulous reviews on Thursdays - so watch out for her posts. I've also been lucky enough to have the lovely, Emily Ritter from (YA)y Books! tossing some great reviews my way.

The biggest change on this blog in the last year has been the emergence of New Adult. I'd had Beautiful Disaster hanging out on my computer for a long, long time and then it was published and was brought back to my attention, so I finally read it and since then I can't get enough NA. I wasn't going to review it on the blog at first, beause I wanted to stay strictly YA, so I started out with posts briefly highlighting NA books I was reading. Then I decided, it's my blog, it's my place to talk about books, and this is what I was reading. So I started posting NA reviews (although, still not frequently) and I created a NA guide (still a work in process) and I will stick up for this controversial genre any chance I get. And I'm proud to say that I now blog about YA and NA.

I can't imagine not having this outlet now - I have no idea how I read before. This day totally snuck up on me so I didn't get a chance to pull together an event or really think about my goals in the upcoming years, but I had to write something to mark this occasion. I just hope there's a lot of life left in this blog and that it will open more doors and bring new people into my life as it has done in the last two years.

Monday, June 17, 2013

2 Year Blogoversary

Two years ago today, I posted my first review. I don't know what I was expecting out of this when I sat down to start this blog. I do know it's gone through several stages and it's meant something different to me at different points. Two years ago, I had just returned from a year in Spain and was living back at home in Northern Minnesota. Since then I've lived in St. Louis teaching Freshman composition and I took time off from my grad program and moved back home. I've gone to Denver to attend the Denver Publishing Institute and then moved to New York to work in publishing. Seriously, these last two years have been crazy.

And, as always, books are the common thread through all the different places I've lived and paths I've been down. I've met a lot of wonderful bloggers and authors and other bookish people over these last two years. The first year was a lot of figuring out this blogging thing and cultivating my own little space to talk about books. This last year has seen a lot of changes, both in my life and in my blog. I've had the lovely Caralyn guest blogging she did a wonderful job keeping things running while I was at the Publishing Institute. Then in the last couple months, I've taken on a co-blogger, Jackie, who's been posting fabulous reviews on Thursdays - so watch out for her posts. I've also been lucky enough to have the lovely, Emily Ritter from (YA)y Books! tossing some great reviews my way.

The biggest change on this blog in the last year has been the emergence of New Adult. I'd had Beautiful Disaster hanging out on my computer for a long, long time and then it was published and was brought back to my attention, so I finally read it and since then I can't get enough NA. I wasn't going to review it on the blog at first, beause I wanted to stay strictly YA, so I started out with posts briefly highlighting NA books I was reading. Then I decided, it's my blog, it's my place to talk about books, and this is what I was reading. So I started posting NA reviews (although, still not frequently) and I created a NA guide (still a work in process) and I will stick up for this controversial genre any chance I get. And I'm proud to say that I now blog about YA and NA.

I can't imagine not having this outlet now - I have no idea how I read before. This day totally snuck up on me so I didn't get a chance to pull together an event or really think about my goals in the upcoming years, but I had to write something to mark this occasion. I just hope there's a lot of life left in this blog and that it will open more doors and bring new people into my life as it has done in the last two years.