The Personal Pleasure of Book Reviews

I have always loved reading. When I was a child, one of my greatest pleasures was reading Enid Blyton's Famous Five and Secret Seven books. When I was a teenager, I discovered James Herriot's books in the school library and another love was born. These days I continue to read every day and enjoy discovering new authors to add to my reading list. Reading is, for me, an essential part of life. To discover. To lose myself. To feel emotions brought by another's words. To be inspired by their life and to add meaning to my own.

Being on Twitter has opened up a world of Indie books to me. Books which deserve to be seen. Writers who have spent months crafting their words and then having the courage to upload their book for others to see, critique and enjoy.

There are so many books to choose from in the self publication market a good book can go unnoticed just because of, for instance, a bad cover. I don't know the authors, I have found the ones I have chosen through Twitter and other various websites.

I will usually seek an author out if I plan to do a review and add them to my Twitter list so I can let them know I have done a review when I post it up. I have noticed the difficulties of self promotion which authors have. Twitter is a fabulous tool for self promotion but authors get criticism for overdoing their book plugs with constant tweets citing Amazon links etc to their work and for the retweets they do for other authors doing the same. Book reviewers blogs are the key for authors and allow them to showcase their work modestly. I hope my blog will add to the help these authors need to get noticed.

One thing I can say to self publicated authors on Twitter is this -

Please put 'author' in your Twitter name so people like me can find you easily!

Often authors will put their details at the end of their book but it's not enough to get noticed or found by the general population, in my opinion, especially in a place where many people have the same name as them! It also encourages people to find out what you have written, if they are as nosy as I am...

I read several books a week and review those on my blog which I feel deserve to be seen. It's only my opinion, of course, but I love the idea of spreading the news of a book which has made me think and tugs at my emotions or is simply a well told story.

I just love a good story and if it reaches my emotions then it reaches my blog :)