Yes, I'm almost two weeks late AND I think part of that is because...I celebrated the wrong damn blogiversary last year. I started this blog on August 5, 2009. 2009 to 2017 is not nine years, it's eight! Oh dear.
Anyway, this is officially nine years of blogging here and though I've slowed down, I'm not tired of it. It's my own little corner of the web and it's here when I feel like sharing about books and cats and whatever else. I'm not going to have any fanfare this year. That can be next year when it will be 10 YEARS! Wow!
A big thank you to everyone who loyally reads my blog. I appreciate you so much. This blog has been instrumental in opening my world to so many like-minded people who I now consider the best of friends. What greater reward could there be?
I'm two today....or should I say the blog is!!! It has been a wonderful two years of discovering great books and meeting a group of awesome fellow bloggers. I hope to continue this journey for many more years and I couldn't do it without the wonderful people who take the time to visit and read my blog...my loyal followers/subscribers. I'm actually on vacation right now so I don't have a lot of time for this post (I was going to schedule it before I left, but alas...), but I wanted to share an exciting giveaway with you. Also, I have something cooking in my mind that I'm hoping to bring to fruition soon. Details will be coming up in the near future.
For the giveaway, I will be giving away a $10 BetterWorldBooks gift certificate. They have free shipping worldwide so this will be an INTERNATIONAL giveaway! (One winner)
I also have for you today a giveaway that was donated by Nicole at Tribute Books. I want to thank Nicole for her generous donation. What is being given away are the following five eBooks. This giveaway is also INTERNATIONAL and there will be five winners.
Patrick Brown was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania. He graduated Magna cum Laude from Georgetown University, where he won the Morris Medal for best senior history honors thesis. He currently teaches high school social studies in the Mississippi Delta through Teach for America.
Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania on April 9, 1958, Patrick Joseph Walker has always been a seeker of truth in all things. His earliest perceptions of life were colored by familial devotion to Irish clan and the Catholic Church. An early scholar, he attended Scranton Preparatory School and was later accepted into the Special Jesuit Liberal Arts Program at the University of Scranton. During a hiatus from formal education, he worked as a staff writer for the Legislature in Saipan. When he returned to the United States, he was awarded a Philosophy Fellowship at Fordham University. Today, he "works" as an editor and proofreader of educational materials for a local correspondence college. His "real" work, however, involves studying the works of Blaise Pascal and Friedrich Hayek. He lives in Factoryville, Pennsylvania, with his artist POSSLQ, Ginger Cody, her daughter Anna, and the family's two dogs, Lilly and Rosie.
Diya Das was born in India on 24th September,1991. She is currently a senior at Wyoming Seminary College Preparatory School at Kingston in northeast Pennsylvania. She lives in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania with her parents.
A National AP Scholar and a member of Johns Hopkins University's Study of Exceptional Talent program since 2004, Diya attended the Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Sciences in the summer of 2007. She is currently the co-editor-in-chief of her school newspaper, The Opinator, and a member of her school's chorale and orchestra. In her free time, Diya figure skates and plays piano and violin.
Molly Roe is the pen name of Mary Garrity Slaby, a veteran language arts & reading teacher at Lake-Lehman Junior Senior High School. Mary holds a Ph.D. in education from Temple University, and Pennsylvania teaching certification in six areas. She has pursued the hobby of genealogy for the past decade. Mary was born in Philadelphia, raised in Schuylkill County, and currently lives in Dallas, Pennsylvania with her husband, John. They are parents of two grown children, Melissa and John Garrett, cover illustrator of Call Me Kate. Digging into the past has given Mary newfound respect for her ancestors and a better understanding of history. Call Me Kate is the first in the author’s trilogy of historical novels loosely based on the lives of the strong women who preceded her.
Kenny Luck'sBio:Kenny Luck is a graduate student at Marywood University in Scranton, Pa., and holds a Bachelor’s Degree in History and Political Science from the same institution. He writes for The Weekender – an arts and entertainment weekly – and The Independent. He is currently working on his second book. He enjoys recording music, book browsing and travel.
Jay Luke's Bio:
Jay Luke is a musician and artist from Throop, Pa. A graduate from Marywood University, Jay is very active in all things art, whether it be through painting, performing with his band, or through his day job as a graphic designer. As a project engineer of the Olyphant Coal Miner Memorial Association, he has delved deeply into the origins of the area and the forgotten histories of the towns around him.
Passionate about not letting future generations forget their local origins, he took on this project to reconnect readers to the past. As writer and poet Wendell Berry once said, “The past is our definition. We may strive, with good reason, to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it, but we will escape it only by adding something better to it.”
Ren Adams Bio:
Ren Adams is a professional artist and writer currently living in Albuquerque, N.M. The bulk of her work is done with traditional Chinese brush painting techniques, a centuries-old practice of using ground charcoal and water to create delicate worlds on paper. An ideal brush painting captures the spirit, or “Qi,” of the subject, not just what it looks like. Ren also teaches art & Eastern philosophy courses through the University of New Mexico Continuing Education department. She has been painting and sketching for over 20 years and is a southern California native.
For this giveaway, I am trying out Rafflecopter for the first time. If you've never filled out a Rafflecopter form before, you can check out this quick tutorial: http://blog.rafflecopter.com/2011/07/how-to-enter-rafflecopter-giveaways/If the form happens to not be working, please let me know in the comments and complete your entries there.
You do not have to be a follower, but if you do follow you get five extra entries. You must complete the first part of the form (leave a blog comment) in order for the other entries to work.
If the form will not let you add your daily tweet, please fill out the main entry again with “DO NOT COUNT” in the Extra Info box. It will then let you complete the daily tweet.
This giveaway will have six winners. The first place winner will receive the gift certificate. The subsequent winners will have their choice of one of the five eBooks.
I have always marched to the beat of my own drum and I'm not any different when it comes to my blog. I just do not want to be like everyone else. That being said, I do have some guidelines that I try to follow when it comes to my blog.
Honesty--I am honest to a fault. Sometimes I'm told that I'm too honest. But I think it's important. My reviews reflect my true opinion of the book. In no way am I ever influenced by a need to please an author by saying I adored their book when I didn't. However, I'm a firm believer that every book has a redeeming quality (except for ones I could not finish...which are very few). That's why I do not have a ratings system. I just have a hard time putting a number on my opinion.
Humanity--in other words, kindness. I believe that there is no reason to be unkind. I try to reflect an air of friendliness and camaraderie on my blog. I try to respond to all comments that are left and I appreciate each and every one.
Humor--I have a bit of a sense of humor, which may show up in some of my posts. I just like to see the funny side of things. Laughter is great medicine!
Individuality--Some may visit my blog and think, "My God, is her blog cluttered!" I've never been called on it. Mostly I get a lot of compliments. But I know that mine is probably one of those blogs referred to as cluttered and with that pesky music player! Oh well...I feel like my blog is kind of like my room. My own place to show off my interests and uniqueness. If it offends the sensibilities of some, I do apologize. Well, actually I don't! LOL!
Knowledge and Learning--I have a feature (that I have been neglecting terribly lately) called Addicted to the Past. It is to pay homage to my love of history and historical topics. I do it because I love writing about history, but also because I love to share with others and hopefully they might just learn something new!
So there we are. Just a few little guidelines that I try to blog by. I hope everyone enjoys my blog. I do want to make it a pleasant experience for others while still being true to myself.
I have created a Challenge Blog to chronicle and keep track of all the challenges in which I'm participating. It's called Challenges of the True Book Addict. Pretty original, huh?! Hope you will stop by there and check it out.
Just wanted to get the word out...Tracy, my sister, has a blog now!!! She may not post much unless she gets the bug like us book bloggers and can't control herself...LOL! The most important thing is that she loves books and has interesting things to say about them. She titled her blog, The True Book Addict's Sister, which I consider a high honor. It is truly an honor to be her sister. I hope you'll stop by and say hello!
I created a button for my blog and I had to give a shout out to the wonderful domestic diva at the Oikology 101 blog. I just did a random search of the internet (using these search terms "making a button for your blog") and her blog was one of the results. And boy does she know her stuff! I now have a beautiful new button...you can grab it if you'd like...on my left sidebar. Thank you so much Oikology. You rock!
If you would like to make one for your blog, click on the Oikology 101 link above and follow her simple instructions.
