Secret Life of a Book Blogger and Writer Tags

Exciting news, people! First, today you get to find out all my writing and book blogging secrets. Secondly, I'm tackling two tags today, and two tags next week, and soon my tag backlog will be reduced to TWO only. So if you have tag things, TAG ME IN THEM.

^^ That was true when I wrote this post. A few days later as I schedule it, I have been tagged in new things. It does not matter. STILL TAG ME FOR EVERYTHING. I shall get to it!

First, Emily @ Loony Literate tagged me to talk about the Secret Life of a Book Blogger! I was eyeing this one for ages because it looked ridiculously fun, despite the vague questions.

1. How long have you been a blogger? Two years and a half! Admittedly, for the first year and more I completely ignored the blogosphere, so really it's only been a year in the real blogger life.

2. At which point do you think you'll stop blogging? I genuinely don't know. I love the book blogging community (even though that was too long; we should just call ourselves the blookunity) but I'm also having trouble keeping up with my twice-weekly blog schedule.

Expect that I'll switch back to weekly posting at some point, and then maybe biweekly. But will I give up on blogging?

3. What is the best thing about the community? Well, the "blookunity", clearly. (I'm loving this name too much.) Also that we can be absolutely crazy and no one will question it.

4. What is the worst thing? What would you do to make it okay? When the words are stuck on their way from your heart to your fingers, or the words come but they're the wrong words. Not sure that there's a way to fix it, but I am working on revisions.

5. How long does it take you to create/find pictures to use? I'm trying to rid myself of the habit of running to Google images and spending 3.4 seconds sourcing them, so instead I use 8.4 days taking pictures of things in my house and negotiate a treaty in 6.1 months with the graphic design witches.

Gifs, though, I'm never going to stop using those. Those take seconds, especially with my Pinterest board.

6. Who is your book crush? I'm going to have to say Holland from A Darker Shade of Magic is pretty adorable, but also enough of an antagonist I can feel completely justified in throwing my TBR at him. Even magic cannot withstand the weight of my TBR. Puns ahoy!

7. Which author would you like to have on your blog? Vague question, so my answer is: George R. R. Martin. I'll distract him with lavishly described takeout, borrow Topaz Winters' dragons, and rip the next books out of his fingers.

8. What do you wear when you write your blog posts? See, I kind of write my blog posts everywhere all the time, so it's hard to generalise. But probably mostly in my PJs.

9. How long does it take for you to prepare? Well, typically it takes me about one week to identify a suitable person, maybe two more weeks to murder them, and then I have to wait for the next full moon to brew the necessary ointments. Then I make my sacrifice and voila! Blog post.

10. How do you feel about the book blogger community? I said this once, I'm gonna say it again: we ought to rename ourselves 'blookunity'. All those in favour, I'll see you in the comments section.

11. What do you think one should do to get a successful blog? I'm still working on that, but my tips so far:

• Readable design. Seriously, I started out with white-on-black text and what was past me even thinking?
• Socialise in the blookunity. (I refuse to believe this is not a word. IT IS.) 
• And of course, have fun.

(As always, I am nominating people for both tags at once, so keep on scrolling!)

Next, Opal has tagged me in the Writer's Life for Me Tag!

1. What kind of writer are you?

2. When did you start writing? What made you want to try it? I'm pretty sure I started writing because we had to do compositions for school. Then I wrote a terrible The Golden Compass rip-off (three, I think, but we don't talk about them). I tried it because ... words, I guess?

3. What inspires your stories? Other stories.

4. What themes do you like to explore in your writing? Feminism, racism, rebellion (normally poorly executed and unwise rebellion), legacy, deception. I'm gonna quote my own tagline: magic, madness, and murder.

5. Are you a pantster or a plotter or a bit of both?

I think that even my outlines are very short drafts, and my first draft is just a very detailed and messy outline. You can check out my posts about sparse draft if you're interested in my blitz writing strategy.

6. Where are you at in your journey? Querying, agented, published? So, I should be querying Winner Takes All, but I also have this nagging feeling that I ought to set it aside for a year or two and revise it then. So right now: just writing.

7. Have you ever entered any writing contests? Finaled? Won? I probably have, but I genuinely don't recall since I typically only enter city-wide contests with themes like "Good people good deeds!" and ... I don't even like what I submit.

8. Who are your writer heroes? There are many, most of them published authors, but the online writers who are the reason I am still writing today: Heather. Christina. Topaz. Cait. Aimee. And everyone who has ever given me writing advice or read my works or anything.

9. Have you been to a writing conference? Share your best or worst conference experience. No, I haven't, and I'm miserable.

10. Top 3 tips you'd give to newbie writers? I have to say I'm not that experienced, but:

• Delete the aspiring before writer. You write. You are a writer.
• Writing is hard. Love it anyways.
• Write what you want, but not when you want. Write constantly.

This time, I'm tagging some fabulous commenters on The Devil Orders Takeout for both tags: Ashley, Romi, Liz Brooks, Nirvana. Thank you so much (to everyone, but particularly you few) for your continued support!

Should book bloggers be called the blookunity?!? What tips would you give book bloggers or writers? Who are YOUR writer heroes?

Join my takeout army to receive monthly letters of magic, madness, and murder!