A short while ago, Andy Robb set up the UKYA Blogger Awards, and I was amazed (seriously – my jaw literally dropped!) to find myself on the list of nominations. Then yesterday the shortlists were posted for the other UKYA Book Blogger Awards, organised by Faye, and I was just as surprised to find myself on there too (yep, my jaw dropped again!).
I’m sure that a few others have been surprised too, as I’m not a traditional blogger. However, when I sat and thought about it, I am doing the same things, just in a different format. If you don’t know much about me, I own The Book Club Forum, a book forum which has now been running for almost 10 years. There’s also a connected review blog, plus I occasionally ramble about books on here, my personal blog.
I don’t run a full book blog, as I don’t have the time to do it justice – and that’s the lovely thing about a forum, the content is provided, day after day, by the members. Some chat about the books they’ve read, some post full reviews, whilst others have conversations about all sorts of book related topics.
Considering the forum is broad, covering all genres, why am I listed for UKYA awards, I hear you say? Well, YA is a passion of mine, and especially our own UKYA. Despite being in my 40s, I read a lot of YA, and I love passing on recommendations. I’ve also been lucky enough to meet quite a few of the authors at signings etc, and I pester chat to even more on twitter. They are, without exception, lovely people!
I keep up with all that’s happening in the YA world, I review ARCs, newly published and established books, and I try to support the authors and publishers on twitter and facebook.
So, I feel as if I’m doing the same as the wonderful bloggers, just in a different way. I don’t feel the need to run a full book blog, because there are so many wonderful ones already out there, and I like to focus my attention on my forum and on twitter.
I don’t believe for one moment that my nominations will go any further, but it means SO MUCH to be acknowledged. Both awards are great, and both as special as each other – and to whoever thought to mention me, I thank you so much. Congratulations and good luck to everyone else on there, you all do a great job.
My final word – if you haven’t checked out a book forum before, or if you’ve had a bad experience in the past (I promise you we’re a nice bunch), why not give us a try? 🙂
Sitting on a Cornflake 