From Barbara Fister’s Place, September 22, 2014
In August, 2014, I concocted a small survey for crime fiction book bloggers. This survey relied on a convenience sample drawn from my Twitter connections, the Crime and Mystery Fiction room at Friendfeed, and bloggers who I follow and contacted personally, inviting them to participate, so it is not a comprehensive analysis by any means. I should note that book bloggers are numerous, with 1,458 book review blogs listed on the Blog Nation directory. There’s even a book for authors who want to court them – The Author’s Guide to Working With Book Bloggers by Barb Drozdowich – which mentions querying bloggers as if they are literary agents. Most of the bloggers who I follow regularly and who took this survey are serious about their reviews, but are largely indifferent to page views and influence. They love to read mysteries and they enjoy sharing their thoughts about them. Some focus on writing reviews; others engage in contests, book giveaways, and guest posts from authors as well as sharing their reading experiences. Though I doubt they would consider themselves cultural gatekeepers, bloggers play an increasing role in the marketing and discovery of new books as the space for book reviews shrinks in traditional print publications.
By the numbers
First, the demographics: of the twenty respondents, twelve were women, eight were men. The largest number (11) were from Europe, followed by North America and Australia/New Zealand. As for their ages, none were younger than 25. Six were between 25 and 45, 11 were between 46 and 65, and three were over 65.
Nearly all had blogs focused primarily on crime fiction, with half mixing book reviews with other mystery-related materials and seven who focused on book reviews. All of the bloggers enabled comments, and just slightly over half moderated them. (Of those who didn’t, at least one mentioned removing comments that were obviously spam.) They all found blogging a positive experience, with half selecting “mostly positive” and half choosing “extremely positive.” (I suppose that’s hardly surprising, since if they didn’t enjoy it, they’d stop!)
I asked bloggers to choose the top three ways they obtained books. Getting review copies from publishers and purchasing books were the most commonly chosen options. The third most common source of books was the library, with review copies from authors following close behind. Though these were the bloggers’ most common sources, they weren’t necessarily equally distributed. One blogger added in a comment “I buy nearly all of my books (95%+).” While two in comments mentioned that getting free books from publishers was a plus, another pointed out that it could be a mixed blessing: “once your address is sent to one company, lots of other people seem to have access to it,” resulting in lots of unsolicited books.
I asked about venues in which bloggers frequently discuss crime fiction with other readers. Other blogs topped the list with