Book Blogger Confessions #12

Book Blogger Confessions is a meme every 1st and 2nd Monday hosted by Karen from For What It’s Worth and the Midnyte Reader.
It’s where book bloggers “confess” and vent about topics that are unique to us.
Feel free to share, vent and offer solutions, and remember to visit For What It’s Worth or the Midnyte Reader for other confessions!

This week’s confession:

How does blogging effect your real* life? Are friends and family supportive? Do you find that blogging cuts into family time? How do you strike a balance between the two?*

Blogging does not majorly affect my real life. My friends don’t know I run an anonymous review blog. My husband does, and he’s incredibly supportive. He’s always saying I need more books. He’s always making recommendations of books he enjoyed. When my computer died and I had limited access to do my blog posts, he offered his dying computer to use whenever I wanted.

My mother is another matter. My mother doesn’t approve of my reading young adult, so I haven’t even told her I run a review blog. She thinks I should ‘grow up’ (I’m 26) and read adult literature like Maeve Binchy. When I tried to explain that I love ‘mean girl’ books because the mean girls always get their comeuppance, liked in The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove where she’s thrown off the cliff at the end, my mother said it was unrealistic and there would be a lot of legal issues to do with the character who threw her off. I said if I wanted to read about legal stuff, I’d be a lawyer.

I tried to explain that I read YA because the characters dealing with their shit helps me deal with my own, but she said I should be reading boring adult books about people who can’t make rent or are infertile and want a family or who are middle aged women whose husbands leave them and for the first time in their life they can be themselves and, you know, stuff I just have no interest in reading.

But you know what? I think adult books are boring. The only adult books I read are fantasy, and they are certainly not realistic. Why read about a normal life, everyday life, that you are already living? I want to read about stuff I will never do or experience – to get the experience. To stretch my imagination, not confirm my worst fears about life: that a person IS BORN, THEY WORK, THEY DIE.

So that’s why my review blog is largely a secret.

Blogging does not cut into my family time because I blog when people are otherwise occupied. It’s easy to balance the two: I blog when I have the free time. It’s a hobby, not an obligation.

(I also blog at work a lot but SHHHHHH!)

About Nemo

A lover of kittens and all things sparkly, Nemo has a degree in English Literature and specialises in reviewing contemporary, paranormal, mystery/thriller, historical, sci-fi and fantasy Young Adult fiction. She is especially drawn to novels about princesses, strong female friendships, magical powers, and assassins.