I was going through my Bloglovin’ feed this morning and noticed something that kinda broke my heart.

One of the blogs that I follow – Blogger has removed.  I’m not mentioning names of blogs – for all I know it’s a glitch that is being fixed as we speak.

But just the thought of all that work… just gone.  All the time, and creativity and thought that went into making that blog… just gone.  At someone else’s decision, not mine.  It does break my heart.  I cannot even imagine what I would do.

This is the exact reason I always have and always will use WordPress.org for my self-hosted blogs.  Yes, it does cost money to self-host.  But to me it is worth the cost for several reasons.

1.  NO ONE will EVER take away my hard work in an instant.  I decide to keep the blog running or not.  Only me.

2.  I run several blogs, not only in the book reviewing niche.  Those other blogs are part of my income.  If they suddenly disappear, by someone else’s decision – there goes a few monthly bills that won’t get paid. ( yes, I review items on commission on blogs of mine that are over a decade old, I will never be private jet rich, but it does supplement my other income )

3.  The only censorship that I face on self-hosted blogs is self imposed.  As long as I have the proper disclosures available for the public to read – no one is going to shut me down.  And I keep certain genre of reviewing separate from the main book review blog for that exact reason.  I don’t take stupid risks when it comes to compliance.

4.  I cannot replace an entire blog.  Yes, I have backups.  We all should.  But the “feel” of this blog would disappear forever.  You cannot replicate the comments, the feeling of a blog easily.  Once the name you are “Known” by is gone – you are starting from scratch.

I am emotionally attached to Keeper Bookshelf.  It’s not much, it’s not huge – but it is mine, it is me, it is the heart and soul of my love of fiction.  If I lost this – I do not honestly know if I would start again.  I cannot fathom losing this place.  Four months ago it was a fun, occasional pastime – now, it is the first thing I do when I wake and the last tab I close down on my computer at night.  It is important to me, for my own reasons, and I will never take the chance that someone could take “this” away from me in a second…just hit a key and it’s gone.

I am not saying that I am right and self-hosting is the only way to go.  Lord knows I completely understand finances or lack of them.  I wrote this to simply say – think about it.  If you are not self-hosting all of your hard work, blood, sweat, tears, laughter and time could be gone in an instant.  I really don’t want to go to my feeds and not find your blog there anymore, if it wasn’t your choice.  Just think about it, okay?

**This is an emotional post, the thoughts poured out of me – I intended no offense to anyone about where they put their blog – I just don’t want to see it gone for no good reason.**

Sometimes I just have to ask:  Why?

I’ve just come from a post that has totally taken a possibly entertaining novel off of my TBR Pile and tossed it on the “give to Goodwill” pile.

In the very first sentence of this blogger’s “review” she has told me the ending of the story.

Why?  Why bother to read the book now that the ending is spoiled for me?

I will admit that yes, I’m frustrated and yes, I’m mad.  But for the love of the written word why in the world would someone tell me the ending of a novel without warning me?

I’ve wasted $7.00 on a novel that I’m not going to pick up.  Hopefully, someone else who buys it at Goodwill for a dollar will enjoy it.  (and yes, that is sarcasm)  But it’s not only the money (I, like most people, have a limited book allowance per month)  What truly bothers me is that I lost the chance to enjoy a novel that I was looking forward to.

I understand that we all review differently.  Some tell most of the story, leaving the ending to be read by the reader.  Some offer only teasers and their own opinion of the book.  While others completely tell the entire story in a summary fashion.  All of these styles work, and I usually know how far I can read on a review before I have to click away in order to avoid big spoilers.

But when the ending is in the first sentence of a review?  There is no time to realize that I don’t really want to be reading this.  At that point, I already know the ending, all that would be left to me are the parts up to that ending that I was told – too early.  Getting to read the ending AT the ending is part of the joy of reading, one of the rewards of a story well told.

Today, I was cheated out of that – and yeah, I’m mad.

Do you schedule posts ahead much?  I do… sometimes.  I am far from consistent about it though.  So, Anna, over at Herding Cats & Burning Soup has this Blog Ahead Mini going on for the beginning of May.

So go over to the   Sign Up Page Here   and check out the limited amount of “rules”  It’s so easy and we’ll get a head start on the coming months when vacations, family events and just summertime is out there waiting to be experienced, ya know?  So this is good.  Really good.

If I could get some basic weekly stuff up and ready to go ahead of time, that would give me more time to take care of other stuff… set up a system and I’d be good to go.  That is my overall goal of this.  With one main blog, and a few specific genre blogs it can get backed up.  So good habits start right now.

Interested?  Then go on over and check it out.

I love NetGalley.  The idea of it, the variety of novels offered there, just about everything.

Ah yes, that “about” thing.

I am a fast reader, I review rather quickly but always trying to keep the reviews within a week of a novel’s release.  Some publishing houses request that, and it simply makes sense to talk about a book when it is due to be launched.

I have a decent ratio at around 78% to 89% – it fluctuates depending on how many novels must “wait” for the reviews to go live because of release dates.  I am trying desperately to keep my requests to only a month or two ahead so that the ratio stays in a reasonable area.

Yet, I’m pulling my hair out over three publishing houses.  So, I’ve decided to simply no longer request from them, especially Harlequin.  I do not want a long list of declined requests on my profile.  And that is just a personal dislike, I don’t know that it affects the approval rate or not.  I’ll stick with the houses I’ve reviewed for already, and maybe branch out to smaller publishing house divisions.  But I will not touch the “big guns” again for at least a year, if ever.

It’s not as though I cannot go out and purchase Harlequin novels myself – and I often do.  It’s not that I’m looking for freakin’ free books.  It is that I enjoy the various lines at Harlequin and their authors.  But, nope, not going to get myself in a hissy-fit any longer.

To be honest, I don’t know if this blog will ever be “big” enough readership-wise for those “big publishing houses”.  And I shouldn’t let it bother me so much either.  I know this.  That damned pride, ya know?

Ah well, I’ll wait them out for a year or two.  I can be patient, in spite of these current words.  I can be.

So, how long did it take your blogging to reach the point where the larger publishing houses thought your blog worthy of their offerings?  Just curious.

While I don’t normally send you off to other websites (I’d much rather keep you company here 🙂 ) – I came across this amazing article – thank you Uncle George Takei – that shows some truly awesome  tattoos that are inspired by the books these folks loved enough to have them inked.

Please check them out.  The article link is right here.  –  or simply click on the image.