Book Blogger Insider Tag

On By reenchantmentoftheworldIn Ola, Piotrek, silva rerum, tag, Two-shot

We’re rather selective about tags, but when Lashaan from the one and only Bookidote blog tagged us with this one (thanks!) we decided it’s interesting enough to participate 🙂

1) Where do you typically write your blog posts?

Ola: At my desk, where my computer usually resides 😉 It’s a very neat wooden desk by a large window, and having my back to everything else helps me to concentrate on the task at hand 🙂

Piotrek: My desk is where my computer resides always, as it’s a desk-top. This desk faces the entire room, becoming a kind of the bridge of the SS MyHome. Sometimes I call it my battlestation, I do some gaming here 😉 I also really need two screens, both at work and here, it’s just so much better than a one-screen setup, for any work with sources. Or just to watch YouTube while I pretend to work…

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2) How long does it generally take you to write a book review?

Ola: Hmm, do we count the preparation time? 😉 I almost never write reviews right after reading a book, so the books usually stays with me for a while before I start writing. But the writing itself takes anywhere from 2 to 6 hours – the Two-shots definitely take more time than single posts, but are so much fun! The Witcher post took probably up to 8 hrs, but it was an exception.

Piotrek: It depends on the amount of research. 4-8 hours usually? I write slower than I used to in the university days, and I work more with number than words, so maintaining a blog is a great exercise, but also a challenge.

3) When did you start your book blog?

February 2015

Long time ago! 😀

4) What is the worst thing about having a book blog in your opinion?

Ola: It’s all in the theory of alternative costs 😉 Time is the most precious resource to me, and blogging takes a lot of it.

Piotrek: Exactly. It eats time. Less than it used to, now that we compromise and post on an almost-weekly basis, but still a lot. I could read a few more books per year without it.

5) What is the best thing about having a book blog in your opinion?

Ola: The community of like-minded (at least in some aspects ;)) people and the opportunity to share one’s emotions and thoughts on books with others.

Piotrek: Yes, it’s fun, it’s educational, it gives me a sense of connection with like-minded individuals.
Also, it adds some discipline to my reading. I notice more details when I think how I would review what I read, even if the review never gets to be written.

The cost/benefit analysis clearly show we should continue with the thing!

6) What blog post have you had the most fun writing so far?

Ola: Tough question. Writing the Witcher post was definitely very entertaining and rewarding, and I expect the oncoming nostalgia posts to be lots of fun as well. Contrary to what some people think, I’m not overly happy writing very critical posts – I consider it my duty in the service to the community 😛

Piotrek: Yes, well, if you say so 😉 For me… Witcher is one of the favourite ones, certainly, and I definitely like our collaborations the most, co-authoring the post is fun!

Of the ones I wrote alone… it was fun to put my delights and frustrations with Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series into writing…

7) What is your favourite type of blog post to write?

Ola: Reviews; Two-shots specifically, for they let us preserve our usual banter on line, despite the real distance. I also like the art posts, but they are becoming quite rare to the time constraints.

Piotrek: Definitely the two-shots. Or reviews of books that impressed me strongly shortly before I started writing (in a good, or bad, way 😉 )

8) When do you typically write?

Ola: Late evenings and some rare quiet moments during the day.

Piotrek: Evenings mostly, I’m an office drone 5 days a week. Sometimes – weekends.

9) Do you review every book you read?

Ola: Absolutely not. That would be very difficult to achieve. My list of titles waiting for review gets longer every month, but I’m a firm adherent to the “quality over quantity” adage 😉

Piotrek: No, with my writing speed, I would have to seriously limit my reading. And recently I’m also reading quite a lot of Polish political books, too niche for Re-E.

10) How do you write your book reviews? With a cup of coffee or tea? With Netflix? Cuddled with your fur baby?

Ola: Tea, obviously 😉 Music in the background is very welcome, instrumental, classical, classic rock or soundtracks.

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My teapot. When I drink tea, I drink tea 😛

Piotrek: It’s winter, so I drink a king of tea-soup with raspberry syrup, honey, lemon and ginger. It warms me up and is supposed to keep me healthy, way too many colds this season. I drink plenty of coffee, but that’s before 6 PM. Occasionally, a good beer. Plenty to choose from these days!

My favourite mugs. The one on the bottom is 0.7l and quite a lot tea goes there. Batman keeps my coffee warm for a long time. And caption on the one with tortoises says “there are moments in a tortoise’s life, when you just have to punch someone in the face” I  feel like that after writing a strong, negative review 😉

11) When do you write your book reviews? Right after finishing the books? Two weeks after finishing the book?

Ola: Usually long after finishing the book, a month or more.

Piotrek: Same here. With the way my schedule works, it’s usually a couple of weeks.

12) How often do you post?

Ola: Once a week or two weeks, depending how you count ;).

Piotrek: And it used to be precisely two posts per week, week after week. Unsustainable in the long run… but we pledge to continue, with reasonable regularity.

These were some interesting questions, and I hope they helped you understand us better 🙂 I see no need to nominate anybody, but I’d be happy to read the answers to these questions on any friendly blog!

Ola: We’re looking specifically at you, Chris and Maddalena, since Bookstooge has already been nominated 😉

17 thoughts on “Book Blogger Insider Tag”

  1. Nice questions, and neat answers. Not too many surprises too, judging on the posts I’ve read so far!

    If ‘Chris’ is me, then certainly I’ll consider it—but it’ll have to be in the New Year, I’ve already scheduled a number of posts over the next week or so. (The perks of being retired. But not shy and retiring.)

    Solstice time is upon us again, so hope you can both relax, one in the Polish winter, the other in sweltering Oz (‘strewth, mate!’)…

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply
    1. piotrek

      Thanks! And, no hurry 😉 We really liked this one, as we’re usually rather secretive and here we have this pretext to talk a bit about ourselves 🙂

      Hope you’ll have good time yourself, it’s such a nice occasion, regardless of where one stand ideologically… my favourite part is seeing my nieces unpacking presents 😀

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

    2. Thanks!
      It’s you all right, Chris 🙂 We can wait, as long as it takes – we are good at waiting! For example, my post on the 11 books that influenced me is still waiting to be written 😉

      Solstice, Christmas, non-denominational time for peace, and joy, and family – hope you’ll enjoy it too! We certainly plan to, and even in the peak of NZ summer I’m busy in the kitchen preparing traditional Polish dishes 😉 But then, after Christmas Eve dinner and presents – off to the beach!

      Liked by 1 person

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  2. GREAT!

    I am glad you typed up that quote from the turtle cup Pio, that made my morning.

    And blogging, whether just writing, or just reading, and even more combined, really does take up so much time. I think I figured out one month that I could read an extra 2-4 books a month if I didn’t read anyones blogs. But that is not a trade-off I consider worthwhile. Posts like this are awesome and totally worth reading.

    A month before you write a review? How in the world do you remember anything? I’m assuming you’re one of those “note taking” kind of people?

    I am glad you are still posting regularly. I continue to be even more impressed by how seamlessly your dual-authored posts turn out. I could never do that in a million years, not even if my co-author was Mrs B.

    I hope to put my version of this out sometime in January, when I need a post to catch up since I’ve been totally slacking in reading this month.

    Cheers!

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply
    1. piotrek

      Thanks 🙂 We don’t have that many authors in Poland, apart from Sapkowski, but I would pitch some of our cartoonists against any competition, I might do a post about them one day. It’s more than just a commentary of the daily political issues, some of the get very existential…

      Sometimes I write a few lines, some basic ideas and angles I want to approach the review from, sometimes I just write about books that made big enough impression to be remembered long 🙂

      I’m waiting to read your version some time next month, then!!

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

    2. Thanks! 😀

      Blogging is very rewarding, both in terms of social and personal growth 🙂 But it does take awfully lot of time 😉 Still, as you said, it’s worth it!

      I’m definitely not one of the note-taking people 😉 I only ever write down quotes, and even that I do rarely when reading fiction. I do extensive notes on my non-fiction, work-related, so I don’t want to do it for what I consider pleasure-reading.

      And thanks again – we’ve come up with a good scenario for the dual posts, we create a loose structure and then fill it in according to our personal preferences. It’s a lot of back and forth, and quite nicely mirrors the real discussions we’ve had. The whole blog started off when we began trading opinions on books we’ve read and decided to make it a bit more permanent…

      We’ll be waiting to read your answers, then! 🙂
      Wishing you joyous Christmas!

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

  4. This was hella insightful. How much distance separates the both of you in real life? 😮 I love the dual-monitor setup. I too work with two curved monitors and well.. it’s also a gaming setup hahaha I like how much time you both put into each post, and I really do sympathize hahahaah But the quality is still far more outstanding. I don’t know how you both have such an exquisite vocabulary. Oh, do I have to bother mentioning how much I approve the Batman thermos/mug thing? I need one of those. Definitely going to hunt one down tomorrow. 😛

    Thanks for doing this tag and for the shoutout! I appreciate it a lot, you two! 😀

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    1. piotrek

      Thank you for the kind words 🙂 Hope you get as much out of our posts as we do when we read yours!
      As you know as good as we do, reading is the way to work on one’s vocabulary 😉 BTW, thanks for the advice to see Spider-Man, it’s a superb movie, I’ve just seen it and… best Spider-Man movie ever? Quite possibly..

      Liked by 1 person

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  5. Pingback: Reading and blogging in 2018 | Re-enchantment Of The World

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