20 September, 2009

Book Blogger Appreciation Week



This week was Book Blogger Appreciation Week (BBAW) 2009. Read all about it here. I'm late to the party because I hadn't really heard about it until it was already under way, but better late than never. The shortlisted blogs in each category are listed here, and exploring them all should keep you happy for a long time.

If that isn't enough to occupy you, Online College has compiled a list of 100 Best Blogs for Book Reviews.

May I take this opportunity to thank whoever it was who nominated me for BBAW Best History/Historical Fiction Blog. I have no idea who you are, but I am guessing that you must be a reader here, so thank you, whoever you are!

I'd like to mention some of my favourite blogs that weren't shortlisted in the BBAW category. Tanzanite (Daphne) has already posted her shortlist (I told you I was late), and I heartily concur with her choices. Here are some of my favourites that aren't already on her list:


  • Living the History. By Elizabeth Chadwick, author of many medieval historical novels, including The Greatest Knight and The Time of Singing. Includes re-enactment events and discussions of her writing process

  • Greyhounds and Fetterlocks. By Brian Wainwright, author of The Adventures of Alianore Audley and Within the Fetterlock.

  • Historical Novels Info. Historical fiction news, reviews and interviews by Margaret Donsbach.

  • That's All She Read. Nan Hawthorne's candid opinions on historical fiction from all periods.

  • Tanzanite's Shelf and Stuff. Reviews and new releases.







And if Book Blogger Appreciation Week wasn't enough, Amy at Passages to the Past and a group of other historical fiction bloggers organised a Historical Fiction Round Table, with giveaways, interviews, reviews and special guest posts. The round-up is here.

6 comments:

Daphne said...

Thanks for the mention Carla! I wass so glad to see that you were nominated - I think you have some of the best and most thorough reviews out there!

Gabriele Campbell said...

Congrats on the nomination. You deserve it.

It's not only the content, another aspect I like is that your blog doesn't have a ton of images in the sidebar (images in the main text are not such a problem, thus I blame it on Blogger) and no animated banners. There are some blogs I've stopped reading because the animated banners and the cover image links in the sidebar don't load well in IE6. It's a bit of an overload, too.

Carla said...

Daphne - thank you, and you're welcome! Glad to know my reviews are useful!

Gabriele - thanks. It's a good job you mentioned that because I was considering putting some of the award logos in the sidebar. I probably won't do that now :-)

Gabriele Campbell said...

Carla, I've mixed feelings about that, too. I have put my award logos in the sidebar, but my own blogs loads pretty slow by now, so maybe I'll kick them. Becuase it's clearly the sidebar - all those photos in the main text come up fine and fast.

Though the ones that really cause me trouble have more than 4-5 logos in the sidebar. They have more images, and often an artsy background (that obviously loads from a separate source as well). And anything animated is bad.

Blogger has its problems, but so have blogs from other providers which I read, and that's not even the user side. ;)

Gabriele Campbell said...

Addendum.
I've checked one of the blogs I abandoned some time ago and followed the loading process in the bottom bar. The culprits are definitely the animated files, gifs, and the music thingy she has. Not static pics like in your sidebar.

Carla said...

Gabriele - definitely no animations, music or graphic backgrounds here :-) I may try the logos in the sidebar and see what happens - if my blog becomes slow to load, would you let me know, please?