By Erin Mitchell
You know book bloggers, right? Those tireless women and men who devote countless hours to sharing their experiences with books for....what, exactly?
I’ll tell you this: It is not for the money. While some book blogs generate a little income through advertising, all the book bloggers I know (and I know quite a lot of them) have day jobs. They blog for the love of reading, not for untold riches.
And another thing: This is no small part of what makes their enthusiasm for (or, sometimes, their condemnation of) books they read all the more credible.
I was, therefore, more than a little horrified this week to see this Tweet:
Anyone who knows Jenn online or off knows that she’s as authentic a book blogger as they come. She writes at the incredibly well respected Jenn's Bookshelves and tweets about books she likes. She shares her sons’ experiences with books. She talks about her book club and local bookstore.
All for free.
(I know she doesn’t make a living from her blog or tweets because she also shares tidbits about her uber-annoying day job co-workers, like the woman we’ve dubbed Smelly Candle Woman or the one who was asleep at her desk the other day. Oh, and it’s in her bio, which Ms. Hall obviously didn't bother to gander.)
The simple fact is that Jenn really enjoyed MAINE. So much so, that she had to tone down her review of it. Her enjoyment—and her sharing of her joy in it—was completely genuine.
Which brings us to Kathryn Hall, whom I don’t know and had never heard of before I saw this tweet. Ms. Hall is, apparently, a book publicist, which troubles me greatly because this puts her in a club to which I also belong.
I took a look at her site, and, wow…it has a lot of words. And yes, I’m restraining myself there. Suffice to say that I have an extremely low tolerance for the appearance of pretension, especially when it comes to anything related to books.
So what’s the point here? Simple. Authors, publishers, book marketers and all those involved in creating and selling books need to understand that book bloggers are people too. People who are an important part of the book ecosystem. People who do what they do for the love of books.
Take a moment and thank a book blogger. It matters. A lot.
