The Book Cove

Woot! We just turned two! I'm pretty proud of this blog and having been able to maintain weekly posts even during the busy times in my life. Writing ahead of time and pre-scheduling was a HUGE factor in being able to maintain posts without turning into a ghost blog every other month. And of course there's been L.A. Kelly who has been awesome about providing information on riveting new reads regularly. When I hit year one, I said my biggest goal for the next year was to expand the audience and write a lot more discussion posts. Check and check! Between Facebook, our Google+ community, and here, the interaction and discussion has been excellent! I love that people are reading and enjoying what we are posting and that is what is driving this blog into a third year.  Going into year three I don't want to set any extremely lofty goals. My life is even busier now and I'd rather give myself half a chance at reaching a goal rather than doom myself from the start...

We've officially made it! Thanks to all of my trusty readers for making this past year so great! To show my appreciation I'm having a few giveaways. So without further ado, the following winners are (you've been emailed): Jenna C. Dave A. C.P. K. In a few short days we will announce the winner of our 1 week blog takeover. Day 1: 5 Blogging Facts  (June 1st) Day 2: The Book Cove's Top Posts (June 2nd) Day 3: The Book Cove's Top Contributors (June 3rd) Day 4: The Book Cove's Top Followers (June 4th) Day 5: A bit of a biography (June 5th) Day 6: 2nd Year Goals (June 6th) Day 7: Our Favorite Blogs (June 7th) Day 8: Thoughts of a naive blogger (June 8th) Day 9:  Most recent book purchases (June 9th) Day 10: Giveaway! (June 10th)

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Day 9: Most recent purchases Here is a run down of my most recent purchases (all on Kindle since I've been working and traveling a lot). It's a bit of a genre mix that I'm pretty excited to read/peruse! The Fault In Our Stars by John Green Breath (Sea Breeze) by Abbi Glines The Extraordinary Book of Useless Information: The Most Fascinating Facts That Don't Really Matter by Don Vorhees Day 1: 5 Blogging Facts  (June 1st) Day 2: The Book Cove's Top Posts (June 2nd) Day 3: The Book Cove's Top Contributors (June 3rd) Day 4: The Book Cove's Top Followers (June 4th) Day 5: A bit of a biography (June 5th) Day 6: 2nd Year Goals (June 6th) Day 7: Our Favorite Blogs (June 7th) Day 8: Thoughts of a naive blogger (June 8th) Day 9:  Most ...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Day 8: Thoughts of a naive blogger It all starts with "I'll just write out my ideas so that they're there for whomever wants them and then call it a day." It ends with...well...it never ends. One day I got fed up with too many purposeless reviews and decided that I wanted to start writing my thoughts on a book. I was already familiar with Google tech so to keep it simple I joined Blogger. Within an hour I had my first post published. Then I waited a couple of minutes. Any takers? 1...2...3...that's it 3 people and no comments? I can do better than that!  *Waits a couple of days* 20 people? That's it?! No way! But my reviews are so good! (I'm really not that full of myself, but let's be honest, we've all been here.) Maybe it's my l...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Day 7: Favorite Blogs There are so many blogs that I frequent that it's hard to not list a 100 of them here! Here's the blogs that I peruse weekly to find my next read: Ramblings on Reading - you can find any type of review from YA to NA books as well as new movie/TV releases! A Novel Idea - Chrissy has very similar tastes in books as me so pretty much anything she says she loves I take her word for. She Reads New Adult - This is a blog that will have your TBR list never ending. I have a serious addiction for NA and there is a never ending daily supply of awesomeness coming from this place. Above Average Below Special - I love this book review blog because it has very thurough reviews. There's always a what I liked/didn't like and character breakdown se...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) 2nd Year Goals It has been a very successful first year as far as hobby blogs go. We've revamped the site and acquired a domain name (amazing what a little HTML knowledge can do for a site) We've gained thousands of followers on various social media sites We've been acknowledged by a favorite author, Rachel Van Dyken (I was pretty dang excited about this!) We've been received blogger awards (which I'll admit, I'm not a big blog award fan because I don't quite understand them but it's the thought that counts!) And most importantly, we gained some awesome blogger friends! (see Day's 2 & 3 posts) What more could we possible want in the upcoming year?? Well for starters, I would love to expand the blog to include a permanent ...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Today's post is more of an in-depth bio about myself and the blog. Frequent readers here probably know that there is one main person behind The Book Cove. But often posts are written in the plural form. The Book Cove is more of a community entity than an individual one. And while I do write a lot of posts myself I also get a lot of help. Thus, it has simply become habit to refer to The Book Cove as "we". As for myself, I've purposely kept quiet about my personal life and what I do for a living. Not because I'm trying to hide, but because I want to keep what I do here separate from my (other) personal and professional life. Many of the people that I've worked with on here have come to know me personally and little by little some of that information has ...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Today's post is a shout-out to The Book Cove's top followers. A blog's success can be measured in a variety of ways. I'm not too hung up on follower numbers -- although, let's be honest, thousands of followers is a pretty awesome accomplishment! What I love even more is interaction with my readers. Many bloggers (including myself) post and post and post only to have one or two comments (if we're lucky!). And while we can tell that people are reading the posts based on stats programs, it's hard to tell if anyone is getting anything out of them. Even the simplest "great review" or "I didn't like that book" comment can make a bloggers day/week/month! Even better is when you can establish an online friendship with other readers and blogg...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Today's post is a shout-out to The Book Cove's top contributors. We've worked with many authors, bloggers, and readers over the past year to provide our followers with a ton of fun and interesting content. Here is a look those who frequently contributed to our site. For the full list of contributors and their work visit our Contributors page . Day 3: Top Contributors L.A. Kelley Author of The Naughty List . She’s married with three kids and lives in Florida where the heat and humidity has driven everyone slightly mad. She never cleans under her sofa. You can find her at http://lakelleythenaughtylist.blogspot.com .  Linda is one of the most fun people that I've worked with on here. When she writes she tells it how it is and as a reader you can always relate...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching (June 10th)! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) These are The Book Cove's most trafficked posts over the past year. Enjoy some of our most favorite reads, tours, and discussions! Day 2: Top posts of the year Reviews from an Author's POV  Book Review: Her Grace in Disgrace Blog Tour: The Best is Yet to Com e Book Review: Run Of The Mill Why epilogues are ruining my characters' lives Blogiversary Posting Schedule  *note that future dates' posts will not have a working link until that day* Day 1: 5 Blogging Facts (June 1st) Day 2: The Book Cove's Top Posts (June 2nd) Day 3: The Book Cove's Top Contributors (June 3rd) Day 4: The Book Cove's Top Followers (June 4th) Day 5: A Year of a Blog's Life - how we got where we are (June 5th) Day 6: 2nd Year Goals (J...

Our 1 Year Blogiversary is quickly approaching! How time flies! To celebrate, we are having a 10 day series of special blogiversary and blog appreciation posts! (Enough exclamation points?) Enjoy these random blog facts/stats I've come across that make me feel pretty dang good about this blog :) I've started many previous blogs before but they've never lasted more than a few months...until now! What are your thoughts on these? Do they fit your blogging history? Day 1: General Blog Facts and Stats There are 4 types of blogs: hobbyist, professional, corporate, and entrepreneur ( Technorati )   This definitely falls under hobby Average lifespan of a blog is hard to figure out, but SocialDialect personally figured it out based on the blogs that they followed and found 11% went silent or dead over the course of a year!  Blogging can take a lot of time, even when you're just writing "one small post". They're fun to think about but sometimes the...