I've been thinking a lot about my blog lately and have wondered what I need to do with it. I wish that I could be more consistent and blog at least every other day, if not more, but I'm just not sure that will ever happen. Part of me wants to be more committed and try to make this a "successful" blog (getting way more than the 20-ish hits per day that I get now) and part of me wants to just not worry about it and post whenever I feel the urge, even if that's only once a month. Either way I feel like I need to make some goals for this new year. Here are some of the things I've been thinking about:
- I want to read my own books this year. I have so many books and I keep passing them over for books I see at the library or books I read about on others' blogs.
- I want to read the classics and modern classics that I've always meant to read but have never gotten around to.
- I want to post reviews for all the books I read this year. I don't think I wrote reviews for half of the books I read in 2009. I'm going to do much better this year.
- I want to find a way to simplify the review process. I'm not sure exactly what I mean by that but I want to come up with a way to write about the books I've read but to do so in a way that won't stress me out. It may not seem like it to you because my posts are pretty simplistic but most of the time I agonize over how to write my reviews. I'm not a good writer so I really stress over each word, phrase, and sentence that I write. I've seen some examples from other blogs that I may copy to help me write my posts more easily. I will try to get permission from those bloggers first before I copy their format. (Do you think that's proper blogging etiquette or should I not worry about it?)
- I would like to make my book blog a little more personal. I started out with a separate book blog and personal blog but I haven't written on my personal blog in over 6 months and I don't really want to start again now. I'd like to bring a little more of my personal life into this blog but I don't want to over-do it either.
So that's what I've been thinking about. I know most of them aren't quantifiable goals but they are the things I would like to work on in the coming year. I also want to add a few features that will take some time but will hopefully be available soon:
- List of favorites
- Archive of all books by title
- Archive by author
- Archive by rating and review
- New look and layout
Lots of work to do. We'll see how it goes. Many thanks to all of you who have read my blog this past year and here's to hoping this next year will be even better.
