The Would You Rather Book Tag: I'm It!

Thanks to Wesaun at Oreos & Books for tagging me in my first ever blog tag! *confetti*

With that said ... I'M

I hope you get that reference.

Would you rather only read trilogies or standalones?

The saner covers.

 FREEBIE QUESTION! Serieses (someone please tell me the plural of 'series' so I stop embarrassing myself) forever. Trilogies forever. All the books. All the sequels. When you've got a good thing going, why stop at one book? Or three? Or ten?

I'm a fanatically patient person with books, and am willing to give well-reviewed and recommended books a long time to build up into awesomeness. Multiple books are ideal for me. I get VERY ATTACHED to my beloved serieses.

Would you rather read only male or female authors?

How gender bias makes me feel.

I don't choose to read books by author gender, actually I rarely consider who the author is when selecting the next book to read (unless it's a familiar name). All my book choices are based on recommendations, cool summaries, and tbh pretty covers.

HOWEVER.

Given the state of the book publishing world (and the world in general), where the odds are stacked quite firmly against marginalized groups, this strategy does come with a rather unfortunate effect. Like I said on the #weneeddiverseblogs tag on twitter--Even as a staunch feminist and minority WoC, 3/4 of my bookshelves easily represent only a small slice of society. Which is fortunate enough to have advantages many of us don't.

It's harder to be extensively marketed, harder to make a splash, and harder be respected, as a woman author (how many of us have heard dismissive readers say, "Oh, I don't read women authors, I don't like reading about sappy romance."?). Publishers simply publish, and push forward, more male authors. Society's patriarchal bias means that readers see, read, and recommend more male authors. Ah, I see that you want data, O Discerning Reader. Here's an excellent analysis in Clarkesworld Magazine of gender bias in professional SFF markets. If you want an even more intense analysis, repeatable through the years, check out the Strange Horizons' Count. I've linked the 2014 Count, but they've been doing this every year.

With that said, I do make an effort to add more female authors, and more intersectionally diverse authors (which means minority ethnicity + woman, or LGBTQIA + minority ethnicity, etc.) to my TBR pile. I ignore author characteristics entirely while selecting the next book to actually read, but I try to make my TBR pile more representative of society as a whole. Unstacking the deck in my own personal bookshelves, you might say.

But I certainly wouldn't read only one gender.

Would you rather shop at Barnes and Noble or Amazon?

Life mission: get to this bookstore.

Dang, this is hard. I love physical bookstores. But I also love a variety of choice in books.

B&N, I've found, has a severe dearth of fantasy genre books and almost never updates its shelves, except in the case of highly sought or hyped books. Which I don't tend to read (I read 5 yrs behind the genre usually because I'm cheap and MMPB are waaaay cheaper than HB). But ... you can physically touch the book, see the book! Amazon is good if you already know what you want, browsing is hard. But I can get so many more books from Amazon than B&N.

I suppose I choose Amazon, then. But I get to keep used bookstores, yes?

Would you rather read only 5 pages per day or 5 books per week?

LESS THAN THIS PER DAY?

Oh, dear. 5 pages per day? Only 5? 35 pages per week?

5 books per week, hands down. My TBR pile will accept no less.

Would you rather be a professional author or reviewer?

I have carefully considered this question.

 Well, you've seen my writing on this blog, but no reviews (YET).

EEEE KITTEN.

Oddly enough, I don't really intend to become a professional author, despite the fact that I'm pretty involved in the writing community. At one point I did--but then I started to read Miss Snark's blog, keep up with publishing news, and realized that all the work (especially marketing) required of the author wasn't something I wanted to do. Maybe I'll publish short stories someday, but never novels.

Professional reviewer? Hmm. I like reading books. I like jumping around and telling people about books. Reviewing books is hard, though. I'm just the average reader, after all. My credentials for reviewing books are that I like books and read a lot of them. But I basically have three dials on my internal assessment compass. 0 : THIS WAS THE MOST AWESOME THING EVER, FLAIL. 1: Meh, was okay. 2: THIS SUCKED SO BAD OMG, LET ME SING THE RANT OF MY PEOPLE.

(In my reviews on this blog, I do intend to be a bit more expansive than that obviously. But that's basically my gut reaction after finishing a book)

So, if I had to choose, I think I'd pick professional author. Just because I think I could do that a bit more ... professionally.

Though if GIFs and memes are totally OK in Professional Reviews by Professional Reviewers ... that may change.

Would you rather be a librarian or a bookseller?

The letters don't fit *twitches*

EASY. Librarian. Cause I can't sell anything to save my life. Librarian is all the recommending and none of the selling. Plus I can lurk around and peer at people suspiciously over my glasses and SHH the annoying idiots who insist on long phone conversations while the rest of us are busy READING.

Would you rather read only e-books or physical books?

PSYCH I HAVE AN OPINION.

Physical books. The E-Reader is NOT A THING to me, I deny its existence and despise the trend of electronic-only stories. Why? Why this hate, you say? It's extremely selfish. My eyes are not okay with long periods of staring at screens. Plus I read crazy slow on screens--so slow that I irritate myself and go mad.

And I just really like the weight of a book, the action of turning pages, the ability to take it wherever I want without needing a plug or battery, and of course the added bonus of confusing fellow public transport riders with the extravagantly ridiculous covers SFF is often blessed with.

Ah, Darrell K Sweet, you are a legend. An odd one.

Watch out now, for by the powers invested in me, I tag:

Mars @ Mars is Cool
BD aka Rin aka J.C Wright @ J.C Wright
Andrea @ Overstuffed Bookcase
Kaye @ Watercolor Moods
Angie @ Pinkindle

(if any of you don't want to be tagged / have already done this let me know and I'll tag elsewhere! And please let me know if I did something wrong. First tag and all.)

MEMES.