[Cam’s Bookish Tales] HOW I ORGANIZE & MANAGE MY REVIEW COPIES

The simplest way for me to organize my books is by their release dates. Being a mood reader makes it difficult to stick to a TBR which, in turn, makes my review copies pile up. In the beginning I had a very messy system that ended up with me having more 40 backlogged review copies. Not at all greatest moment, I tell you. I was horrified and scrambling to raise my NetGalley percentage.

I knew I couldn’t get to these reviews, so – with great embarrassment – I had to decline many of the copies I received. This isn’t something I would recommend to anyone because it is actually disrespectful and is an inconvenience to publishers who have a set number of review copies to hand out. This hurts any future chances you may have with the publishing company.

After that, I decided it would work in my best interests – and the publishers – to set up a system to help me keep my review copies in check.

Once I receive a review copy, I mark down the release dates using Google Calendar. The books and their release dates are color coded to keep them separated from upcoming blog posts. Now, before requesting, ALWAYS make sure this is a book you want. My tip is not to request it immediately but to give yourself some time, like a week or so, to consider your decision. 

I try to request no more than four copies a month (but that also depends on how quickly you read). With this rule, I’m able to narrow down my choices of books to request instead of going after 10 books and suddenly having my approvals flooded! But this is also the point that makes me anxious because I begin thinking things like what if I don’t get approved for book A that by the time I request book B, it’s too late. However, I learn to ignore this because if I really want the book, I could just buy it! This way I won’t be wasting the publisher’s resources and I can take as much time as I want to enjoy the read.

I read the books a month or two before their release, if I can. This is the toughest part for me due to my mood reading tendencies, as noted earlier. Once the reading is done, I don’t always review the book right away but I do make a bullet point list of my thoughts. It helps to have notes or highlights while reading but that’s a preference. Then I draft the book review, take some simple pictures if needed, then pick a schedule – preferably a week after the release.

Reviewing books shouldn’t have to feel like a responsibility but a hobby. Book bloggers believe that reading the latest books or the most popular will bring a lot of traffic to their blog, however, this is not the case at all! Truth be told, book reviews are necessary for you to run a book blog. You don’t have to review the latest and most popular to gain a following. In fact, if you notice, book reviews are not my most popular posts and I wouldn’t be writing them had it not been for my enjoyment for analyzing books.

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This week’s discussion is a part of the Book Blogger Hop hosted by Ramblings of a Coffee Addicted Writer. The week’s questions was How do you organize your books for review? Does it work for you or have you had to change it?

How do you organize your books for review? Does it work for you or have you had to change it? Do you have any review copies that you couldn’t review?

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