solutions - elgeewrites

How I Choose My Next Read? AKA. Finding A Method To My Madness

I think I may have a problem.

No not the one with my having a never ending list of TBR books (is that a problem even? Doesn’t everyone have that?)

And it is not about feeling guilty about all the book reviews that are pending. But thanks for reminding me of that.

And the one about how I struggle with a book even when I don’t like it, without DNF-ing it? Great, This is exactly why I don’t write out what I think nor I have a conversation with the mini-me.

You know what, I will tell you guys myself! I am an indecisive schmuck when it comes to choosing my next read. And I used to think it was normal too, until I saw those beautiful posts on monthly and weekly TBRs. Well, as much as they inspired me, they broke me.

How I Choose My Next Read?

So I guess I need a system. FOR CHOOSING MY NEXT READ. That makes sense doesn’t it? I should not be wasting an hour or two of my precious time on deciding what I am reading next instead of reading it already. Especially with the tremendous growth I have been showing when it came to planning of late. It should be a cake walk right?

Let us get on with it, I will choose my next read right away WITHOUT WASTING ANYMORE TIME.

Method 1: Choosing the book (ARC – Advance review copies) that is closest to the publishing date.

Well, these seem obvious right? With planning and I being so chummy these days, I just have to choose one that is near the deadline.
I never thought it was going to be this simple. Now I can just read!

BUT.. But I don’t feel like waging a war with the zombie right now. Maybe, I am in the mood for a romance, especially since it is winter and all.

Let me check the Goodreads’ romance shelf.

*Ends up ordering two or three or ten books and spends the night worrying about how broke I am*

Method 2: Choose a book from the recommendations and reviews of your favorite blogger

Today is new day and a new beginning. Let me pick one book before I have my morning coffee so that I can start reading while I commute or run errands.

Let us make this easy. Pick the one that your favorite blogger recommended recently.

But which one? I have so many favorite bloggers and they have so many books on their recommendation.

It is going to take a while, guys. Let me get that coffee first.

*Ends up blog hopping till it is dark, skipping breakfast, lunch and survives on coffee*

Method 3: Pick one that has stayed the longest on your TBR

I will just pick the one that I have in my TBR already.

May be the one I added the first, like the First in first out. This method works so well for stocks in the stores, it should work me too.

OMG, I need to read THIS, I have no idea why I have not read this. It has been so long that I don’t even know where it is. I just have to find this on my shelf.

Well, that is a bust. I have no clue where it is.

Method 4: Pick the one right next to you, literally.

You know what? I am just going to pick that random book that is physically near me and save the time instead of searching for one in these heap.

But my e-reader has like 100s of books and it is near me as it should be as always. Should I pick that one up already? The ‘latest one I added in that’ makes more sense right? What am I if not the most sensible one!

I am going for it. And I am just going to ignore the hard copies and their beautiful covers. Like I care about them. Or do I?

Method 5: Take a quiz or two

Sigh I give up. I can’t do this. I wish someone told me what to read. Someone like Goodreads but not exactly that.

Something more personalized and more according to my mood. Maybe I will take one of those quizzes.

*Goes deep into the world of GIFs and food and never emerge out*

Method 6: My go to method for choosing my next read

I give up. I may as well pick something that is not on my To Be Read shelf.

What did I say? OhMYGod. Thats it, I am picking THE book SHE recommended. I know it is not my TBR. but I am adding it now.

But your TBR is crying!

Sssh! I am done with trying to be organized.

I am a mood reader and bad at taking decisions and I accept it after I waste 3-4 days where I read nothing, almost every week.

Well, if you have a system that works for you, enlighten me. Save my TBR! Let us chat.

How to hide Pinterest images from your post? (Blogging solutions)

Bloggers, discussion | 29 comments

I love Pinterest. Not just for saving ideas or recipes to try out later, but also for my blog. I am not sure how much traffic that has generated for me yet but it definitely has.

Like everyone around here I caught with the Pinterest train when it came out. But I used it mostly for personal stuff like saving for holiday decor or a hairstyle that I wanted to try out for an occasion.

While I knew about group boards that worked well for so many bloggers, I was reluctant to join them because well I am majorly a book blogger and many of my posts are going to have a book cover as its feature image. That may not be so attractive to the other bloggers. So never joined them.

But then I joined some amazing group boards that are mainly for book bloggers and here I am pinning away to glory. If you are not following me yet on Pinterest, ensure you do right away.

Now that I have established I like Pinterest, though not as much as Twitter, I still hate having to navigate those atrociously huge images in a post. Especially when you have more than one Pinterest size image. There I said it.

For the uninitiated, the recommended Pinterest image size is 735px X 1102px according to Canva, which is definitely huge. I know some of us dislike seeing too many GIFs in blog posts but imagine having to see these humongous images.

What if I say you don’t have to see them at all? In fact all my posts have a pinnable image or two, but they are never visible when you scroll down the post. And it is definitely not difficult.

What am I talking about?

Let us for example take my post “Plot holes: Watch out for these inconsistencies!” and I have added one image which I have shared on Pinterest as well.

Pinterest images — *Post with Pinterest image*

Don’t you think the is disrupting the reading experience? Imagine when I have 2-3 images of this size in 500 word post. I find them very intrusive.

However, if you scroll through my post you will not find that huge ass image bothering you at all.

That is what, my friend, I mean by hiding a pinnable image.

Why do I have to hide the Pinterest images?

I want to keep my posts looking neat and crisp.
I sometimes have more than one pinnable image for each post.
My pages load faster, despite the image dumps.

How do I hide the pinnable image?

Step 1: Add the image in your post like you would usually do.

I am using Classic editor on WordPress, but this works on Gutenberg on WordPress and Blogger draft as well.

Step 2: Next go to edit mode (HTML on Blogger)

Step 3: Find the relevant code of the image you are trying to hide. It looks like this.

Step 4: Here comes the important part. Add this handy code.

<div style=”display: none;”> IMAGE CODE GOES HERE</div>

It will look like this after you do.

That is it.

If you switch back to visual mode, the picture will blocked as below.

Save and publish the draft. You are good to go. Don’t worry, all the other images and GIFs will be still visible and can be pinned if you still want to.

You can still add the blog images from your site to Pinterest like you do usually.

Either,

Pin the image directly from your post (here Plot holes: Watch out for these inconsistencies! ) using the Pinterest button on a social sharer.

(OR)

Click Save from site on the Pinterest website and add your link there.

Either way you will find this Pinterest image ready to be pinned. And if you click on it, you will be directed to my post, like you would expect.

Now you will be able to share as many images as you want from your posts, but without pesky images bothering your readers.

(Psst.. There is a pinterest image hidden in this post as well. Just try clicking the pin button here)

Let me know if you tried this on your blog. Do you want to see these small yet handy solutions for your blog? Feel free to ask me if you have any doubts.

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