Another good reason of why I blog is because I get to meet like-minded bloggers online over time. Call it mutual support or mutual respect or simply mutual pollination of ideas, I treasure sustained mutual bumping of each others’ websites. Some last over the years. Writing can be a lonely affair. It is always good to have a handful of visible companions while finding my ways in this mental jungle of mine. Monthly page-views mean little if none translates into a visible dialog, a visible relationship.
OK. Enough digression. Long story short, Jo (from UK) and I both need a reading buddy for Salman Rushdie’s “Midnight’s Children”. And she has this idea. Why don’t we start a read along and in the mist of it, get readers to join us online? Great idea. I said on! Over the weekend, she has come out with a thick business-like e-proposal detailing the logistics and the options for this read along exercise. Goodness gracious me! Jo means business. Even though I fear of reading Salman Rushdie’s novels, I have this urge to grind through it. Who knows? I may enjoy the process.
That was back in August. Since then, 9 other bloggers (together with their respective readers) have joined. The idea is pretty simple. Over the read along period between Nov 12 and Dec 13, book club discussion questions will be hosted at her website every week. You can discuss these questions over at her website or you can express your views in yours and have the link sent to Jo. She will do the collation and etc. If you do wish to get your readers of your website to participate, feel free to sign up at her website.
CLICK HERE TO START!
Today, I did a lengthy count (and I can only count the things I can see, such as comments posted in my site). 85% of my active readers are female. 12% are male and the remaining 3% are unknown. Judging from what I see on the street, in the bookstores, and in the library, I reckon more girls read books than guys do (and wouldn’t you wonder why?). So, I am expecting A LOT of you heading over to Jo’s website and join us for this read along. Yes? Of course, I need some guy power too though realistically speaking …
External Link: More details on read-along at Jo’s website.
Hello everyone, do hop over to my space and sign up, the more the merrier! It is my first Rushdie and it looks promising, promise of a few good laugh and beautiful prose from Rushdie and discussion from many good bloggers that are participating from UK, Germany, Malaysia, Philippines, India (2), USA and of course Singapore (Wilfrid!).
Wilfrid, I really laugh when I saw you wrote: 85% of my active readers are female. 12% are male and the remaining 3% are unknown
Because a survey of 300 bloggers exactly pinpoint that : 83% of respondents were female, and 17% were male. How about that?
For more stats, see this:
http://biblibio.blogspot.com/2010/08/guys-and-girls-part-1-of-many.html
and there is the first first part I blog about, I just need to hunt down my own blog post.. wait…
JoV – That is a very good pool of international readers!
Wow … those numbers look shocking. I mean, they kind of speak of the same story, don’t they?
OK. I will check out your stats write-up once I am back from work (and back from another movie preview evening … lol).
“Monthly page-views mean little if none translates into a visible dialog, a visible relationship.” well said Wilfrid. It’s also called 缘分 in million of bloggers some could be good friends.
The best thing one can hope is NOT to fall under 有緣無份.
Here’s the first set of stats on the profile of books bloggers in the community:
http://bibliojunkie.wordpress.com/2010/05/01/blog-stats-of-the-blogging-community/
click on the link called : Results Part 1.
What’s a reading buddy? Someone to discuss the book with? I dont have a reading buddy but I share with my friend what I have been reading and getting my friend to read them too (for those that I think its nice!)
How about setting up a reading list (which is probably the list of names of all the book reviews you blog about and those books that you read but not worth blogging/didnt blog abt)? 🙂 it will benefit your readers and me! I always need a list of books to consider whether its worth reading the book/to know what next book to read!
Si Ying – Thanks for your questions! An online reading buddy is really someone to read a book with within a certain time frame, and during that time, active in participating on book discussion.
So, what is going is happen is that from Nov 12 (yesterday!) till Dec 13, a bunch of us start to read the same book. I.e. Midnight’s Children. And every weekend, Jo will post a set of book club discussion questions for us to engage each other. It helps especially for those who have been wanting to read the book but have not had the motivation in doing so.
As for the reading list, it is a good idea. You can find my recently read fictions and non-fiction through the category pick-list on the top right side of my website. Here are the links for your reference.
http://www.wilfridwong.com/category/my-opinion/book-reviews/fiction/
and
http://www.wilfridwong.com/category/my-opinion/book-reviews/non-fiction/
I hope this helps!
yap! i realise what an online reading buddy is after clicking on those links you provided! it sounds interesting but i borrow most of my books from the office library (which is also from nlb but its a smaller database) so they dont really have all the books nlb would have. which makes it limited in a sense. my neighbour at work and i often exchange book titles we read so i hope it continues as long as we both are around! otherwise i might turn to an online reading buddy ? 🙂
Si Ying – Good for you! You have a mini library at work. Are there any national library near your home or workplace? I love visiting the library.
Anyway, if you happen to come across “Midnight’s Children”, come join us 🙂 The more the merrier. From the discussion perspective.
Actually I am quite near the national library (suntec city) but we are shifting too 🙁 i dont have one near my house until mid next year 🙁 haha. ok but i guess i can make more efforts to walking to national lib!
Yap i will! 🙂
Si Ying – Oh OK 🙂 Looking forward to having you join us one day. Hehehe.
Sounds fun, I’ve got an e-copy of Midnight’s Children and I never had the courage to read it (heard it’s rather grilling indeed). Now that I’ll have reading buddies, I’m going to join you guys, Wilfrid and Jo! 🙂
Heyzannie – Yay to that! This is going to be fun! The book does look very thick, and grueling. Lol.
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