I don’t like to brag, but I correctly predicted that Home would win the Orange Prize.
I’m gutted. For two reasons:
Never mind. Let’s see if I can correctly predict the Booker!
I am very pleased with the number of people who visit my blog each day, but only a tiny proportion ever comment on it. I’m very grateful to those that take the time to comment, but often wonder about those who don’t.
I realise that a large percentage just come via google to read about a single book, and I understand why they wouldn’t be interesting in commenting, but there also must be a large number who follow the blog and don’t show their face.
Do you ever lurk on blogs? I follow 173 blogs and I have to admit that I do not comment on all of them. Some are funny and always seem to have 50+ humorous comments by the time I get there. I don’t feel I can match their quality, so I just enjoy reading them. Some are technical (I don’t even understand some of the comments!), so although I sometimes thank them for providing information, I often just lurk. Then there are a lot of book blogs where I probably don’t comment very often. This is probably because they are reading a different genre of book to me (eg. science fiction) so I normally just skim them in case they have a useful blogging post. Is it wrong to lurk?, Should you at least let the blogger know you are there and appreciate their writing?
Was there a period of time when you first started blogging where you read without commenting? If so, what was it that made you decide to comment for the first time? I started commenting on blogs almost as soon as I discovered them. As soon as I found blogs covering the books I loved I was away!
I’d love to hear your comments on this, and whether you think there is anything we can do to get those lurkers out of the woodwork?
Are you a lurker on this blog? If so, why don’t you comment?
What do you think I could do to encourage lurkers to show their faces?
I look forward to hearing all your thoughts!
May has been a record breaking month for me. I read a massive 14 books!! They covered a complete range from Home, which I admit I didn’t finish, to Wilderness which managed to secure one of my rare 5 stars. I managed to complete the Orange short list, and look forward to finding out who wins on Wednesday. Overall it was a very productive month!
Burnt Shadows – Kamila Shamsie
The Post-Birthday World– Lionel Shriver 
2666– Roberto Bolaño. Part 1: The Part About the Critics
The Room of Lost Things – Stella Duffy 
Molly Fox’s Birthday – Deirdre Madden
Home – Marilynne Robinson 
The Wilderness – Samantha Harvey 
Best Intentions – Emily Listfield
Half of a Yellow Sun– Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 
Gilead– Marilynne Robinson 
Theory of War – Joan Brady
The Invention of Everything Else – Samantha Hunt
The Little Stranger – Sarah Waters
Midnight’s Children– Salman Rushdie
Audio Book
Salmon Fishing in the Yemon– Paul Torday
Reading plans for June
I actually hope to read less books in June, as my husband will hopefully be at home and not away on business. This means I can spend more time with him and go out in the evening with my friends sometimes.
I am currently half way through The Master and Margarita, Out and Outlander. It is unusual for me to have so many books on the go at once, but I can’t take The Master and Margarita in the bath with me (regular readers know I like to read in the bath every day!) and I accidentally read the first few pages of Out, then couldn’t stop!! It is really good – possibly a contender for 5 stars? All books are reasonably long, so it might be a few days before I finish one.
I am then going to continue working my way through the list of books recommended by you, stopping occasionally to read a new book or two!
I’ve also just received my copy of The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas from New Zealand. It won the Commonwealth Writers prize a few weeks ago and looks really good.
Did any of the books I read in May appeal to you?
Are you planning to read any of books I’ve mentioned in June?
I hope you had a great May, and wish you all the best for June!!
I’ve seen this meme circulating, so decided to answer the questions for you.
1. What author do you own the most books by?
It is probably Ian McEwan or Penelope Fitzgerald, as they have the most books on the Booker short list – books which I intend to read one day, but haven’t got round to yet (because I’m not massive fans of their books)
2. What book do you own the most copies of?
I don’t own more than one copy of any my own books, although I do have 10 signed copies of The Invention of Hugo Cabret gift edition with DVD
3. Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?
No!
4. What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
It is shocking, but I don’t think I’ve found my type of man in a book yet. Can you recommend any books with a great male character I can fall in love with?
5. What book have you read the most times in your life (excluding picture books read to children)?
I don’t re-read books, as I have too many other books I want to read. I love reading for the plot, and not the language, so once I know how it ends I’m not really that interested. I might start reading books again when I’m older and have forgotten how they end!
6. What was your favourite book when you were ten years old?
I loved reading about other children and so at that point I was reading all the Bobsey Twins and Jennings books.
7. What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?
Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald. I need a bit more action in my books.
8. What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins manages to beat Blindnessby Jose Saramago by a tiny margin.
9. If you could force everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
I would force all book lovers to read A Fine Balance, and all people who claim not to enjoy reading to try The Hunger Games. Do you think anyone could fail to love reading after trying it?
10. Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for Literature?
I’m afraid this is one prize I’m not qualified to judge. Samantha Harvey should win the Orange Prize, and probably the Booker prize for The Wilderness though.
11. What book would you most like to see made into a movie?
I am very scared they’d ruin it, but I think The Hunger Games would be great.
12. What book would you least like to see made into a movie?
Offshore – can you imagine how slow that would be?!
13. What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?
I’m not sure, I can’t think of anything particularly difficult – possiblyRushdie’s Midnight’s Children, but that wasn’t too bad, perhaps I should be stretching myself a bit more.
14. Roth or Updike?
I love Roth, but have never read any Updike. I have some of Updike’s work in my TBR pile, so I’ll let you know next year!
David Sedaris or Dave Eggers?
I’ve not read either I’m afraid. Should I?
Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
I’m not a big fan of any of them – sorry!
Austen or Eliot?
I’ve not read any Eliot either. Terrible aren’t I?! I loved Jane Eyre though.
Feel free to copy this and answer the questions on your own blog, as I’d love to know your answers!
A little plea from me…PLEASE put a search box on your blog!
I love your blogs, and it is great to read the new posts that you put up daily, but sometimes you write really good posts that I want to read again a few months later. Sometimes it’s because I’ve just got hold of a book, and want to re-read your review, sometimes I remember that you’ve written a really good post on how to do something, whatever the reason there are occasions when I want to look at posts you’ve written a while ago.
The problem is that I don’t remember whether you wrote that amazing post in November or February, so digging through the archive section on your sidebar is annoying. Some people have great A-Z lists of the books they’ve reviewed (which everyone should have too!) but it isn’t always the books I’m after, so please, just for me….
ADD A SEARCH BOX TO YOUR BLOG!!!
Is there anything else you wish everyone would add to their blog?
I normally view all the blogs I subscribe to using the RSS feed option in my email programme – Microsoft Outlook. I love this, as it means every time someone writes a new post it comes straight into their own folder just like an email. This means that I can take a little break while I’m working to read the latest posts. If you have never tried this option, then I highly recommend it. It is the best way I have found to view blogs.
In the past week I have had big problems viewing new posts this way. When I went to read the new post Microsoft Outlook would freeze, sometimes for a couple of seconds, sometimes so badly that the whole programme shut down. Yesterday I worked out that all the problems I was having only occurred with Blogger blogs. WordPress ones seem to be OK. I did a little research and found that this is a known problem which is affecting Blogger at the moment.
To avoid this problem I am going to be transferring all blogger based blogs onto google reader. This will mean that I will only check blogger blogs once or twice a day, as opposed to constant checking of the others. Hopefully the only difference you’ll see is that I may be a bit slower commenting on your blogs. I hope they fix the problem soon, as I do love my RSS feeds!
How do you view blogs? Have you ever tried using RSS feeds?
