The emails saying we'd love to but we just can't right now. The power to address everyone fairly, get everything out in a timely manner. The hideous confessions that you just can't break it, it's not for you. The over committingleading to distracted days and sleepless nights. The do I don't I debate over negative reviews. The mass of laundry you haven't time to deal with. The neglected friends and family who haven't seen you get out from behind a laptop for months. The holidays' sacrificed for Convention attendance. The sleep sacrificed at the conventions. The nail biting anxiety over interview questions. The deciding between one five hundred pager you love you'll love or two, two hundred page teen romances you can complete quickly. The possibility that all this work may have no play on anything when it comes right down to it. The more terrifying possibility that it might. The realisation this is almost a full time job and it actually costs you money rather than earning an income. So why do I do it? Why do I review?My name's Adele and I can't stop reading. I can't go anywhere without a hand and usually a back up book. I get one in my bag, several on my phone, more on my laptop. I have concluded a thousand in the house and it breaks my eye to think of the hundreds I have parted with over the years. I go up early for meetings so I can slip in a few minutes reading. I love train journeys because of the uninterrupted hours with a book. I have a pot at the bedside, a mountain on my desk and always three on the go at once. Sometimes I get one a day, sometimes more, sometimes only one a week, but I am always reading. If I'm between books, I mean, I've just finished my main read, but I yet possess my 'bedtime read' and my 'other mood'read on the go, I just need to pick another one to commit to for main. When I started Un:Bound, a little over two years ago (blog years are like dog years but multiply by ten) it didn't really have a name. There was no logo, no team, just me rambling to myself because I required to talk about books. The internet allowed me to talk about the books I know as much and as often as I liked. Gradually I discovered there were other people doing the same. A whole community, several really. Those communities have grown in the time I've been doing this. Always in flux. People I talked to when I first started, the people who supported my efforts, aren't all about any more. Many more have joined up. Un:Bound has grown. We adopt a logo and a team. An awesome team. We do audio and video and have columns on paper and guest posts and get tangled in events and rave about the people whose writing we adore. Still, at our core are the reviews. At our core it will always be about the reviews. My name's Adele and I can't stop telling people about books. I pass books to friends to try, 'just try, I won't be offended if it's not for you but there is something about his humour that will appeal I think'. I exhort them to strangers in bookshops, 'oh if she enjoyed that, then get her this she'll know it, really', I exhort them to people I will never meet, on the internet 'Yay for gun toting chicks who can laugh in the case of terrible death after wiping puke from their mouth'. We all get our reasons for book blogging, and those have been debated elsewhere, but I'd like to imply that most of us are doing this for the same reason I'd like to remember most writers write. We can't not. Whether we do it for months or years, for any case we stop, for a while we are compelled to say and to share. For a piece we visit our enthusiasm and know for books and authors to the earth wide web. For a while we eat, sleep and breathe reviewing. For a bit we let the written word consume us, take over our lives. For a while we are reviewers. For a while we are book bloggers. All those things I mentioned? The stress, the anxiety, the command to other areas of your life? It's all worth it. Maybe it won't always be. Maybe one day I will leave Un:Bound in somebody else's hands or it'll wrap up entirely. Right now though? It's all worth it. I think it will be worth it for a while. Thank you so very much for bringing your situation to the table, Adele! In case you didn't notice, she is stationed out of the UK. Be sure to end by Un:Bound and say hello. She, along with the team, have reviewed a wide variety of books that may blow your fancy.And I remember I should have said at the function of this that reviews are of course important to us as publishers to know that our record is being well-received by our target audience. Of line we would love to see 4 and 5 star reviews constantly, but we see that our books aren't for everyone. Honest, unbiased reviews are all that we can ask of any book reader/reviewer/blurber.So, why do you review? Do you have a blog that you like to transmit them at (we would love to put your link to the sound in our 'Thank you for your second' set of links)? How consistent are you at reviewing the books that you say and do you point your titles to others outside of your 'reviewspace'? For your web link and input we would like to accept you a book to review, winners will be pulled randomly for the first five reviewers. Be sure to get it in by Monday, October 4!
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