After my recent post on trying to better navigate the lit blogosphere world in a matter that is significant to the world at large, Jen Robinson followed up with her own thoughts on blogging about children's books which prompted many comments and Kelly Herold coincidentally unveiled a new design for Big A little a and acknowledged that she has become overwhelmed at late with blogging duties and pulled back in several areas establishing some new rules for how she will run her site. Based on the comments at her site, it is clear a lot of people have been rethinking the time they spend on the web and reading and writing about all those review copies.

I am, as they say, not alone.

One thing I realized from reading everyone else's thoughts is that I clearly started Chasing Ray for different reasons from many other bloggers. Through Eclectica and Bookslut I already had a place to review books, but I wanted to write in a more casual way about literature and also wanted to cover other subjects like my own writing. Most importantly though, I wanted to be able to interact with other writers and readers. I wanted to be part of a literary conversation - any literary conversation - and staking a place for myself in the lit blogosphere seemed like the best (and relatively easiest) way to do that.

Most importantly of all though, I am a writer and I know how hard it is for any writer (other than the super big names) to gain any sort of publicity. It makes perfect sense to me that if/when my Alaska books ever get published (if/when, if/when, if/when), I have a jump on the average debut author by already being known a bit online. Any extra word of mouth helps and at the risk of sounding like a calculating creature, I want to do now what I can to make sure my name is out there later, if my novel or memoir do get their moments in print. I need to be here to accomplish that goal and if I'm going to be here, then I want to do it under my own terms, and in as big a way as I personally can.

The question of course - the big question - is just what that means. What do I have to do here in this space to be satisfied with it? And what do my readers want - or should they fairly be allowed to expect - from me? And do I care about anyone else's expectations? Do I worry about keeping readers coming back here everyday (Mon - Fri)? Should any of us even think about our readers that much?

I mean at the end of the day - what the heck are we all doing this blogging for?

(Oh good God - maybe this is a mid life crisis after all.... :)

Here's what I've come up with in two days of pondering: I want to be part of a big literary conversation. I think one of the reasons we are struggling so much in this country right now is that we don't think or talk about big ideas enough - in many cases it doesn't even occur to us to have big ideas. What gets drilled in our heads from the time we can add and subtract is that we need to get a job that makes good money so we can be a success. The definition of "good money" is different depending on whatever socio-economic background we hail from, but pretty much it is all about the job. Except that strategy is not working. We go to school, graduate, get working, get a place of your own, a family, a lot of bills, a lot of frustrations, a lot of disappointments that you never seem to have enough money for all things you want and then - then you just end up sad and tired and depressed.

One of the things Kelly mentioned in my comments the other day was that Americans don't talk enough about things like racism and war and poverty and I agree with her. I think the reason why though is because we are all too busy with the many mundane qualities of our lives - with the shopping and errands and mowing the big lawn and answering the email and don't even get me started on dragging the kids all over the place and we have no freaking time to worry about what we foolishly hope our elected officials will deal with for us. We never think about big ideas because big ideas are not sold as significant parts of our lives. What we talk about mostly is work because we are taught all of our lives that work is what matters. I can't help but think that if literature and art and natural history and anthropology and other "idea" subjects were valued as much as "getting a job" then it would occur to us to ask big questions or look for big answers in all areas of our lives. We have all fallen for the lure of the quick dollar and it is showing in our general intellectual slump. We don't know what to ask anymore; we don't even know how to ask.

Literary conversations are all about asking questions though and I want to encourage that kind of behavior; I want to get us all asking more about about who we are and who we want to be and just what the heck we are doing with our lives. And it wouldn't hurt if we took those questions to the next level and turned out sights on Washington. Those people could use some hard questions and it's our fault that not enough people have been asking them.

So the nuts and bolts of what I want to do means that I need to be here, front and center, with thoughts on books and authors and just how great reading can be. More importantly, I need to bring to the attention of others books that they are missing, something I've already tried to do to a certain degree but will try even harder in the future. I'm going to dodge internet fights and fits as often as I can (although it is impossible to always rise above it all) and focus on engaging others in the conversation. Part of why I think the multi blog efforts like the Summer Blog Blast Tour and the upcoming (ten days) Winter Blog Blast Tour, and Recommendations From Under the Radar are so important is that they bring together so many different voices on so many different books. What I would love is to get more librarians involved in knowing about the SBBT and WBBT so our efforts to spread the words on great authors could reach more people. I'm working on that right now, but I'm also recommitted to those multi blog efforts. I also plan to add one more - "Curiosities and Obsessions" so we have a week long effort to write about subjects that intrigue us. I think it's a way to let people know about books on things they might not know about and maybe get them curious as well. I love curious readers - I think they are the best kind and any way to encourage that is something I want to be part of. So four big planned multi blog efforts every year and maybe some fun things in between as well, but the four big ones are enough to keep me grounded in my effort to make a difference and also to give my readers something to count on - something they know they can show up here to find out about and hopefully learn from

Beyond that, it has always been Jenny D and Gwenda who have been my favorite literary blogs to visit and I plan to keep on writing in ways I learned from them. Jenny writes long entries on reading and research and sometimes even her goal to engage in sports large and small (way more fun to read about then I thought they would be) and Gwenda keeps her pulse on the happenings in various corners of the lit blogosphere I would otherwise be missing while also writing reviews on titles I always seem to have missed and explaining what it is like to be a writer who works everyday at writing well. They are there for me nearly everyday, and so I'll be here too, keeping up my end of the conversation.

And finally, one thing that I have seen come up in various places is the pressure brought on by review copies. For what it is worth, in 2007 I have received 663 books for review. (I keep a small database so I can track how many I review - just for my own interest.) It is not physically possible for someone to read that amount of books let alone review them. I don't ask for the majority of them - they show on their own. I'll write more later on how I handle the books (the nuts and bolts of piles and donations) but all of you who are overwhelmed need to consider that you allow yourselves to be overwhelmed. Don't take that the wrong way - when I started reviewing I was driven nearly mad trying to keep up as well. And then I realized, after more than three years of doing this, that it's not my job to write on every book in the universe and it's not my job to make publicists happy. They are doing their jobs by sending the books to me - they are trying to get the word out. From there, I decide what I will write about. I make the choice what I will read. No one should feel like they have to even read a book that shows up for review, let alone write about it. The cool thing though is that we all have different taste so every book I pass up, is certainly reviewed (and loved) by someone else who also received a copy. I'm just one link in a huge chain to get readers interested in a book and if I don't review it I need not worry that a book will "die".

I'm not the end of the world for authors - I'm just another small town stop on the way. I'll review what I can and feel good about those but I won't ever feel bad about not reviewing a book. That's just a distraction I can't allow myself to fall victim to, not when there are so many positive things I can be doing for books instead.

Back here Monday - same Bat Time - same Bat Channel...................