Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

I am participating for the first time in the Book Blogger Hop hosted by  Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer.

Each week a fellow blogger asks a question and the participants make a post answering the question. The goal is to make new friends and know more about the bloggers who are participating. So let us get with it shall we?

Question of the week

This week’s question was submitted by Elizabeth @ Silver’s Reviews and she asks

Do you sneak a peek at the number of views your posts have gotten?

Do I obsess over page views?

YES, while I don’t obsess over the numbers, I do check my page views at least once a week. 

As the data and spreadsheet obsessed nerd that I am, I even note the weekly views and have plotted a graph out of it. And the graph looks good curve these days, you guys. Thanks to all your comments and shares.

How do I track my page views?

To be honest I am not an expert by any chance on Google Analytics, I use it to check the performance of the posts and understand the demographics.

Another statistics I kinda check weekly is my Alexa rank. Again I have no idea why I even follow that, except that I do.

Pin me!

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Let us talk

So what other blog related data do you guys follow? And if you have had figured what to do with these data, please let me know. Something good might turn out of being a nerd even. Let us chat.

Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

A Stephen King’S Character I Love (To Hate): Norman Daniels

Dani from Perspective of a Writer gave us a prompt to discuss my Favorite Stephen King Character for the week. As most of you all might guessed that it is for the love of the King of horror that I jumped on to post for this meme. Let us get on to this shall we?

While it may not be the most popular of Stephen King’s novels, Rose Madder will always hold a special place in my mind. My relationship with Stephen King has not always been smooth and it was Rose Madder that made all the difference. So it might not come as a surprise that I would choose someone from it as a character I love…. to hate. 

Yes you heard it right.

I choose a character that I completely hate yet I can’t ever push to some dark corner of my mind and forget about or move on from. Intrigued? Let us talk about Norman Daniels.

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Who is Norman Daniels?

Norman Daniels is the antagonist of Rose Madder. Norman Daniels was a police officer in Aubreyville and married to Rose McClendon. The story majorly deals with how Rose escapes the clutches of the masochist and malevolent Norman, making Norman play a predominant role.

What makes Norman Daniels such a remarkable fictitious character?

He is an abusive husband

Norman is sexually, physically and emotionally abusive towards his wife Rosie. He beats Rosie for reading a trashy book (brace yourself, Misery’s journey) so much that causes her miscarriage. Being a cop and having cop friends makes it easier for him to get away with it. 

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Rose doesn’t even dare to get away from him because she knows he will find her, for about nine more years. And even when she finally runs away, he finds her as she suspected. 

He is racist, homophobic and also sexist

Norman Daniels is a crude redneck that hates more than half the population, quite literally. He hates everyone almost equally, be it women, gays, African Americans and the Jews. He bites homosexual men to death. He doesn’t think twice about killing a witness. 

He is the sickest of fictional human monsters – ever

Norman Daniels makes the other Norman, from the Psycho and the Bates Motel look nice.

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His favorite method of punishing men is to pop their testicles and/or bite them. He has already raped and murdered a witness and continues to punch, kick, bite and murder women and men alike as he stalks his runaway wife without remorse. 

I can bet that one cannot read the opening scene of Rose Madder, that entails the scene of his beating, her miscarriage and him getting away with it, without wincing. I had to put my book down more than once to get over it.

He has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. He is one of the truest monsters not just of Stephen King’s creation but also in any book I have ever read /heard of.

He literally turns into an animal

As if this is not evil enough, he turns into a minotaur by the end of the book.

elgeewrites A Stephen King'S Character I Love (To Hate): Norman Daniels ND


His rage and his obsession literally and figuratively changed him into a raging bull whn he finds out Rose ‘s location and that she is dating another man. He also realizes that she is supported by her lesbian friends at the women’s shelter. He murders them and rushes to Rose’s apartment where he almost kills Bill, Rose’s date.

If Norman Daniels was the worst ever, why and how did he become my favorite character?

Norman Daniels controlled the entire story

As one would expect of a Stephen King’s book, Rose Madder has its supernatural elements. While things are not picture perfect (pun intended) and the supernatural part was okayish at the best, at least for me, it was Norman that made the entire book strong.

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Even when the macho Norman turns to a panic stricken human afraid for his life, I could not ignore him. The book would have worked so much better as a thriller/suspense about an abused woman and her crazy husband.

How many characters, in the entire Stephen King world of books, have had the power to make the book work even without the supernatural elements? None other than Norman Daniels, IMO.

And that to me, that is the mark of a character etched to perfection.

Who is your favorite character from Stephen King’s world? Do you have any antagonists that you cannot move on from? Have you read Rose Madder? Let us chat.

Norman Daniels

Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

How I follow your blog?

You can ask any of my fellow bloggers about the one thing that is vital for any blog and I am sure most of them would assure you that it is ‘blog engagement’. It is no news that we bloggers love making friends and look out for the approval from our peers in form of comments and follows. 

When I decided I would stay on top of the blogs I love and follow, I promised myself that I would have meaningful engagement with my fellow bloggers, not just for namesake. But I confess, I didn’t realize how difficult it was gonna be, given the humongous number of blogs that I ended up liking.

For me following means reading all of their posts and commenting on them. The number of followers doesn’t matter for me as much as the number of responses I receive, in the form of participation in the discussion through comments, likes or shares. If you think like me, then you might like the bloggers comment junction. Now getting on to the topic at hand.

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Earlier in one of my posts, I started a discussion on why I would follow a blog and what you can do to make your blog more appealing to your readers. This post is kinda its logical continuation where we will discuss how I follow these blogs, bookish or otherwise. 

Depending upon the number of blogs that you are following regularly your method might vary. Keep doing what works for you, and if it works well share it with us in the comment section so that we can try it as well. 

Keep yourslf updated in three ways

  1. Social Media
  2. Visiting your blog regularly for updates
  3. RSS feed subscription

Following your social media

While there are so many social media websites that help you follow a blog, not all are equal right? As a book blogger I have my profile on all these sites but when it comes to using them to keep myself updated with the happening in the book blogosphere the following are my favorites.

Twitter:

If you are a book lover, then there is no better place to waste spend your time than Twitter. As an obsessive book blog reader, I love the community and to top it all, I get to read about all their bookish / bloggish and personal stuff here. 

Type of update I find: Rants, New Post updates with link, what you are reading – All in tweet length.

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See what I mean?

Facebook:

While I do have a profile I visit Facebook for personal usage and my feed is filled with bookish posts and updates. I like it that way. 

Type of update I find: Funny Memes, New Post link

The only problem I have with Facebook is not many of the book bloggers I know and follow have a Facebook page for their blog and if they do, they do not update them regularly If your favorite bloggers are on Facebook then you should definitely give them a follow.

Instagram:

These image friendly sites are usually the fastest way to know what my favorite bloggers are upto. I use them only to stalk their book shelves and know about their book hauls. Once I start on #bookstagram I usually end up with some serious book envy.

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#bookstagram

Type of update I find: Book haul, book shelves, What you are reading – pretty book covers.

Visiting your blog regularly for updates

To know what is happening in a blogger’s life, the no-nonsense method is to visit their blog regularly. Of course. But if you happen to like more than say 3 blogs, you know you can’t keep visiting them to get th updates. And here are simpler ways that I use or used. 

Email Subscription:

I am sure even friends who do not have a blog would know about subscribing to blogs via email. I had been blogging for years before I even understood, why everyone (read as all websites) wanted my email id and kept offering an opt in or freebie when I sign up.

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Cluttered Inbox

I know many of my friends still have subscribed my blog through email because it is the most convenient to read the post directly from their inbox as and when they are published or as a weekly digest. Well, this worked for me before I turned a blogger. 

Bookmarks:

I used to mark the sites that I wanted to revisit as a bookmark on my browser. Well, it worked until the number shot up for obvious reasons. Also I never remembered whether I had checked a site in a while or not, let alone leave a comment on them.

Spreadsheets:

When I was following about 25+ blogs I realized bookmarks may not work, especially when I was hoping to leave a comment on them regularly to boost engagement. You know, give and you shall receive has always worked for me

I am a spreadsheet addict who uses it even to-do list, so no wonder I ran towards a spreadsheet to tackle this problem. This worked so well that I never even thought of looking for another solution. For a while.

Spreadsheet
I have attached a simplified version of the spreadsheet I used earlier. (click to enlarge)

My spreadsheet told me when I had to visit a blog and when I had left a comment recently. I almost had 35+ blogs on the list and religiously visited them for about six months, thanks to my sheet. Then something happened and that broke my system. 

RSS based subscription

I moved to WordPress and my own domain, and shortly the number of bloggers I wanted to talk to, learn from and be friends with exploded. And that meant the end of my pathetic little system and I needed the big guns. 

The Rich Site Summary AKA Really Simple Syndication AKA came in as a savior. After the closure of Google Reader I never found a good RSS reader and I had not looked hard enough. But now I had to find one. 

WordPress subscription

Since I moved into WordPress, I tried using the default reader for sometime. While this did its work, but its feed works like Facebook. And I kept missing a lot of posts. Though I still look at it once in a while, I am not fully sold.

Feedly

I should start with I love Feedly and I use it almost everyday. Feedly is a subscription platform that help you read and follow blogs without much hassle. It is pretty much everything that Google reader was.

I organize the blogs that I have subscribed into smaller groups and I hop unto the latest post from the unread list. It lets to add specific posts to boards, which I love.

elgeewrites How I follow your blog? Feedly
My Feedly groups

There are more features like integration to Zapier and IFTTT (another tool that I love) and social scheduling apps on the premium accounts, which I am not using. 

Bloglovin’

Bloglovin’ is almost similar to Feedly. It also allows a blog owner to claim their blog and lets them flaunt the number of subscribers. A few websites even let us read their full content without leaving the Bloglovin’ website itself. Of course we have to hop to the blog / website to make a comment. 

Bloglovin’ lets us even to categorize the blogs you follow into groups and even share them from the app. I know a lot of bloggers swear by Bloglovin’. 

Yet I had no luck on it, until recently. Due to some technical glitches I had not been able to claim my blog and that put me off for a long time. Now their support team has sorted out but I am already in love with Feedly and I might not make a switch any sooner.

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Now that you are here and thinking about following book blogs, start by following my blog and me right now 

Blog | Bloglovin’ | Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram |

So what are your methods to keep yourself updated? Do you use Feedly or Bloglovin’? Which do you prefer? Are there any spreadsheet lovers like me? Let us chat.

elgeewrites How I follow your blog? FollowP
Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

Things I scream when I read the Young Adult lit

You might have noticed I am of late reading a it more of Young Adult literature than other genres. Even though I am trying to keep a balance among all the type of books in my blog, the truth is I have read more YA in the past one year than ever.

I never was into young adult fiction before that and to be honest, I used to avoid them like plague, But then these books happened and the rest as they say is history.

As a result of the surge in the number of reviews I have posted on my blog, the number of unsolicited review requests for YA books have sky rocketed. Not that I complain. But I can’t help but notice some lots of similarities among those novels that I can’t take it anymore. 

How many time do you ask yourself these questions when you read these Young Adult novels?

7) Why do you need a public confrontation?

What is with you, kids and the crowd? In real life, most of us would run away from a confrontation like a plague (at least I do). But if there is a problem in your Young Adult drama filled life, every accusation / confrontation / break up has to be in front of your peers and their mothers. 

Young Adult

6) Who are you, really?

I am yet to meet someone in real life who is so clumsy and yet so graceful when the tide turns. You drop everything, fall down the stairs and even get lost in your own city, but you are independent and gonna fight the dragons. What am I missing here?
How many books have you read about the self proclaimed plain lead who finally realizes that she is beautiful after a make over and the hot guy asking her out? 
Why do the ‘unpopular’ guy have to fall for the popular, mean girl only to realize the awkward plain girl best friend is all he needs? He has to wait for her to get a make over too, I guess. 

Young Adult

5) Is this how teens talk these days?

This is my pet peeve. 
How do these teens in most Young adult books talk in lengthy monologue, quote Shakespeare or be an archer? When did nerdy teens become the default? 
Of course I like reading about nerds but most of them are cut out of a card board. 

Young Adult

4) How do they fall for that person?

Talking about card boards, how does the strong, graceful and special protagonist fall for the love interest that is flat, one dimensional but super hot? Does being physically attractive become the only quality that they are concerned about

I know this is a problem even in adult / contemporary books, but its effect is more jarring in the young adult literature. But I am so done with the dark, brooding bad boy and the popular hot girls as love interests for the protagonists.

Young Adult

3) Where are the parents, teachers – AKA adults?

When I was a young adult myself (not too far past) there is no way that I could get away from the eyes of the adults for even two hours. Befriending rando strangers from the street was a strict no no. And here are kids whose lives are entirely dependent on a random stranger, with no prior qualifications. 
Seriously if there were one responsible adult around these kids most YA plots won’t even exist.

Young adult

2) Why are the adults the bad ones always?

If you did have some adults, they are pretty useless or worse -the bad ones. Your Chemistry teacher is probably producing Meth in your school lab. Or they are killing innocent puppies (which I hope is not true.) 

Or at the least, they are hiding a big fat secret from you. Like you are a vampire or a princess to some small country. Or that you were adopted. How.could.they?

Young Adult

1) Why are you the only one who has to break the rules?

Out of the entire population in your fictitious world, you are the only one who wants to question the authority. And / or open the damn door. And you do not listen to your friends who repeatedly beg you not to do that. 

It doesn’t matter what is lurking in the darkness, you want a part of it, don’t you? Is it because someone said you are the only one who is special? Why are you So.Damn.Nosey?

Young Adult

What are your peeves about the mainstream Young adult books? Do you agree that these problems are irritable or not? Do you have an answers for any of these questions? Leave a comment, let us talk.

Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

Book series, why can’t I love you?

I know that sounded like blasphemy. Everyone I know and their mother is in love with one book series or the other. Be it the infamous Fifty Shades series or the awesome Game of thrones. Especially the YA bloggers read and rave about books that are in so many parts that I have clearly no clue any more.

Do not get me wrong. I am not against the format as a principle. But somehow the books that are part of trilogy or series do not work for me. I have had my share of books that comes as a series and have even loved a few of them.

Over the past few years I physically cringe when I see the ‘##’ near the name of the book, because it is one more book that I might never pick it up sadly.

Why do I get so turned off when comes to book series?

So I am going to use this post as a space to think out aloud why I can’t fangirl over series like everyone else in the world.

1) Damn you, cliffhangers!

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I really hate cliffhangers. I have put my time and effort (even if I had loved doing that) in a book and then it ends abruptly only to be continued in the next. Really? I just can’t stand not knowing what happens to them and I usually have to wait for another year or two.

That brings us to the next problem.

2) Would I be alive when your next book turns up?

I am totally impatient. I want everything and I want them now. So forget me waiting to know whom Elena chooses in the Vampire Diaries series. If I can’t have it now, I am not having any. So what do I do?

Series

Solution: When I do read a series I tend to get them all together in go.

3) Would the part two be as good as one?

How many books do you have already on your shelf but haven’t read for years? I am super ashamed about it too. Then why would I want to add another bunch of books that I may or may not read. I can hear you say, try the first book and then get the other ones, right? Read the previous point.

4) I would be far far behind the world.

Series

Waiting for the series to end naturally means I would never read the books with the rest of the world. You wouldn’t believe how much later I picked up the Pretty Little Liar series, only because I wanted it to end before I even got the first book. Sorry folks I am still trying to figure out who is A when you are busy celebrating ‘her’ arrest.

5) Don’t keep toying with my feelings, people.

Pretty Little Liars also taught me another lesson on why I should hate book series that the character arcs suck. (Actually they don’t, they are fabulous.) But it is sheer torture that I can’t make up my mind whether to hate or love someone. Is he gonna be the killer? Or is it just another misdirection?

Series

This definitely would not happen with a standalone because everything ends when you hit the epilogue. Except you staring at the ceiling trying to figure out what you wanna do with the rest of your life!

It is me, not you.

I know I am missing out a lot.

Series

Still I prefer to have my choice books as standalones.

And the only way I can read a series is only when the books can work alone and can be read in any order. I can understand that a group of friends having their own story in a romance novel series like the Rock Chick series by Kristen Ashley or Macgregor brides by Nora Roberts.

Pin me!

Series

Let us chat

Do you prefer standalones to series? Why or why not? If you read a lot of series, can you suggest me books that would fit my criteria? Let’s chat.

Do I Obsess Over Page Views?

Why I follow your blog?

We all started blogging for ourselves, didn’t we? We wanted to put ‘something’ out there FOR US. It became fun when we found there are others who share the same excitement about blogging that we have. Then we started receiving a comment or two. And much later someone started to follow your blog and even seemed to like your posts.

Sounds all familiar? Not exaggerating, that is literally what happened to me.

I still get a high to get a new follower. I jump to your blog as soon as I can when I receive a comment or a mention; not just to send you a comment but because I am genuinely interested in knowing who you are and things (read as books) you like. You do that, too? See I knew we will have something in common. But beyond the first visit, what will make me love your blog and to keep returning to it till eternity. Okay just kidding I will have to eventually stop loving you when I get to ‘world domination.

Follow

 

I know you don’t care about me, it is okay, but how can you make the other readers love and follow your blog?

1) Dress up your blog

I know I say ‘I don’t judge a book by its cover’, but I do when it comes to a blog. YOUR BLOG DESIGN MATTERS. The visitors decide whether they are gonna like your blog or not even before they read a word out of your post, with just one look at your blog.

I personally prefer white (or whitish background) and the minimal look but I totally appreciate blogs that are pleasing to the eyes and creative. I totally love Dani’s and Simant’s websites in that aspect.

Thankfully we have done away with most of those flashy buttons and crazy color combos that were everywhere in the 2010s, but still, there are one or two of those out there. A clean design with a medium sized font (not cursive pl) is all it takes.

If you are looking for color palette ideas I have two resources that have never failed me:
1) Design seeds
2) Plenty of Color

2) Show ’em where and how?

Okay you have the best design and it looks appealing but where is the search button?
How do I follow you?
What are these random things occupying your sidebars?

The internet is where most of us live. We visit at least 5 to 10 websites in a day – right from booking tickets to ordering grocery (yes I am lazy).

But it is also where I get so distracted by every thing shiny and new. Expecting me to navigate by myself through your website and find posts to love is unrealistic and too complicated. So make it easier for people like us.

Follow

Tempt me with a featured image. Ask me to follow you. Show me what to read next. Link up old posts. Ask me a question in your comment section. Remind me to follow you. AGAIN. Make it easier for me to like you and love your blog.

Of course, we are not dumb. Hey look it is Dr House.

Follow Sorry, we are not dumb, we get distracted. That is all.

3) Tell them who you are and more

This kinda goes without saying that I follow blogs only that I can relate to.
But you know what? We all are talking about books. We all are talking writing. We all are blogging. That pretty much covers everything the reader and any blogger can have common with. Yet we all feel relatable when Cait from Paperfury talks about her love for cake even though we don’t love cake (that is a lie, everyone loves cake – not the point though) or when Clo from Book dragon talks about how she carries more than one book whenever she steps out.

Follow

You see where I am going with this?

Yes, we need to see your shy, introverted book loving personality (or the outgoing, extroverted, snarky ray of sunshine book lover that you are) through your posts, not just books that are on your Goodreads shelf (though that is a good idea for a post). Let us get to know and understand the real you, and we will definitely.

Bonus points if you reply to all your comments.

4) Tell ’em what you think that *book*

Oh now that we know you already and we got through that wall between us, let us talk about why we are here. (We also got your social security number and the maiden name of your mother. Just kidding. I DO NOT know them.) To talk about books obviously. Or blogging. Or whatever the reason you have got the reader to your blog.

Tell us about why you love them. Give us honest reviews, more or few of them. You see since we already decided we love your blog, your personality we have already invested in you. I am rooting for you to read awesome books, and give me honest thoughts on them. Send them as reviews, discussions or listicles. I don’t care. I wanna read everything about what you read. ‘Cuz BOOKS.

Follow

Also if you find the number of responses that you receive on reviews lesser than that on discussions post, who cares? I love telling you all about the emotions and feelings I have about the book. I don’t care even if no one reads it, I will post them. (I am just kidding, I totally care that you read all my posts. Do like them. Please.)

5) Pictures and lots of them

It is a known fact that we all love pictures, imagery, GIFs or whatever. I know y’all are skimming through my post even now but paying attention to the images.
I do that.

If you can make your pictures funny or interesting then you are nailing it. A picture of the book you love with your furbaby (or just your baby) sure would make me smile more than a book cover from the Goodreads.

Here is a video of these adorable Huskies for no reasonn whatsoever.

Confession: I do not have a furbaby nor a human one and that is why I make do with not-so-fab pictures. And when I get either of those I am totally winning the internet over with my awesome pictures.

I will be going to Freepik and Canva in the meantime.

We are at the end of my post now and it is a safe time to tell you the truth and insert a pesky disclaimer. “Please do as I tell you, but not do as I do.” I am pretty sure I am guilty of all the above mistakes at one time or the other or always. But hey, I am all with good intentions and that matters, right?

Follow

Go rock your book blog and make me proud.

It is your turn. Tell me what makes you love a blog or the blogger. What is your secret weapon to make us follow you? Or tell me what makes you unsubscribe a blog. It is not ME, right? Do share with it us.

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