by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig
For a long time, I avoided Goodreads altogether. It’s the kind of place that makes me uncomfortable as a writer and so I figured I shouldn’t be on the site at all.
But I’ve found that I can completely avoid my own books on Goodreads as long as I don’t deliberately look them up. And Goodreads has a lot to offer for readers.
I decided at first that I didn’t particularly want to share what I wrote as my author profile on the site. That’s mostly because I didn’t want to say if I didn’t enjoy a book…as Elizabeth S. Craig, Writer. And I didn’t necessarily want to share what I liked, either and have it be a public endorsement. Mainly what I wanted was a place to track my books, authors I enjoyed, and my reading life and find recommendations. So I set up an anonymous account there.
As time went on, I began to feel a little more comfortable about sharing what I was reading. And I’m not sure why: I’m a horrid reviewer (better at book blurbs). It started with my inclusion of what I was reading in my reader newsletter that goes out when I have a release. I found that when I wrote a few short sentences about several recently-read books, I had a very positive reader response. Readers were actually emailing me back about what they were reading, too.Continue reading