I wanted to use this year to be a bit more accountable for what I read and how I report on the blog and that sort of thing. So, here we are, 6 months in and what have I learned? That reading comes and goes in waves like a fickle creature and being accountable is harder work than it looks! But graphs are pretty.

I also learned that going self-hosted isn’t for me – it makes everything chug to a stop! Eternal Bookcase isn’t a blog that is on any big map of blogs. So, I wanted to be transparent about this in the first section of this post and share my WordPress stats – I love blogging. I have no intention of giving it up. But I always find the stats page interesting. Usually because a lot of bloggers seem to hold this information close to their chests, like some closely guarded secret!

Blogging Stats for Eternal Bookcase.

The first image is from my insights and shows how often I have posted in the past year. April and May are when I tried to go self-hosted. It didn’t work out and put me in a downward spiral of ‘meh’ feelings towards blogging and put me in a reading slump for June. In July, I am recovering, but the books I am reading are… dodgy!

Both of these things have clearly had an impact on my blog in terms of those all-important page views! I’m still trying to get back to the lofty heights I was having before trying self-hosting. But, generally speaking, the blog has been on a downward spiral since changing topics from art/commissions/mostly-hobby in 2020.

I am hoping that posting more will help improve things for the rest of the year, but honestly, it ain’t looking good!!

So, let’s talk money. I have never made good money from my blog! Ever. I have ads enabled purely because it comes with my premium legacy subscription – and I joke about it being my retirement fund.

This month has actually gone pretty well so far and I am making a grand total of 8 cents. Convert that to UK money and I’ve made 5p if I am lucky! I can pick up pennies off the street and make more money than my blog makes!! Good job it’s not about that and all about the reading of books, right!?

Reading Stats

So, onto the actual purpose of this post now that we’ve all had a good laugh! This year, I wanted to read more. I gave myself a goal of 52 books for the GoodReads yearly reading challenge. According to that, I am already on 40. So, fingers crossed, I will make it passed the finish line.

I may have mentioned once or twice that I have hit a reading slump! This really hit in June where I only read three books. Gone are the heights of reading two books a week! I’ll get back to that pace soon enough; I can feel the slump passing now and I’ll be back to reading more serious books soon. I’ve already passed a good chunk of Angel Exterminatus for my buddy read with Dave, but, the Summer Holidays are looming so I don’t know where I’ll be in the midst of all that chaos. I’ve also picked up doing my own writing which has hindered things a bit, so need to maybe knock that on the head and focus on getting some more pages turned.

Speaking of pages being turned! This is how many pages I managed – because some of the books I’ve read have only been really short. Like, Snapshot. Although, I think the shortest on I’ve read so far this year is Orc-Gasm, which was pretty terrible too! Looks like March was a bit of a winner this far in terms of pages and books. Probably because I read Troubled Blood, which was a monster 945 pages long. But, those books are so easy to digest it didn’t hinder my other reading goals.

Star Ratings

I have been pretty lucky in terms of the books I’ve read. Most of them have been 3stars+. Either that or I need to address my reviewing criteria, which wouldn’t be a bad thing! I am pretty pleased with the 5 star books though. Let’s have a quick look at them!

Good to see Sharpe making the list – serves as a reminder that I really should get back on that reading wagon! The Grey Bastards, I still need to write a review. It’s a cracking book and I’ve had the review half written for a while, just need to get my finger out and finish it. Lorgar, came as a bit of a surprise. After reading that book I can honestly join in and say, “Fuck Erebus!”

Where from?

This year I wanted to keep track of where I got most of my books from. I think at one point, I echoed a lot of other book reviewers and said I wanted to buy less books and read some from my reading list. I am sorta, doing okay with this goal? Subscribing to Kindle Unlimited hasn’t helped this cause, nor has requesting books from NetGalley, as I always feel obligated to read them first. I am actually tempted to close down NetGalley for a while purely so I can get some more of my currently owned books down off the shelves. A lot of the Kindle Unlimited books have been Orc related, so I am not sorry for that. There’s no way I am paying to keep those sorts of books!!

As for the types of books. If it’s legible, I’ll read it. I’m not a snob or anything, but I’ve not done audiobooks, I just don’t have time to fit them in. I think if I drove for a job, they’d be perfect, but honestly, this just feels like an excuse to throw in another graph!

Genre

This is one area I wanted to keep a keener eye on this year. I’ve never known where to point my blog in terms of book genres. I know niches work better for blogs and I thought about tailoring my reading towards that. But, then I probably wouldn’t enjoy reading anymore. And, there’d certainly be no weird Orc related books going up on the blog; unless I went in totally that direction. So, I’ll just keep on plodding on. Doing what I am doing, reading what I’m reading and enjoying it. All the while, hoping that things pick up in the pageviews department; cause that’s what it’s all about!

So, as a parting question. Do you have a favourite book of the year so far? I think mine is probably The Grey Bastards; it’s a lot of fun, it’s very down and dirty, doesn’t pull its punches and is generally the sort of thing I enjoy reading – looking forward to squeezing the next ones in