The Blog Squad - Part 29

We are a group of three book bloggers situated on different continents but brought together by our love for books and a penchant for talking about them. We’ve joined our forces to create a collaborative series of posts about book blogging and we hope you’ll enjoy the discussions.

A MAGICAL WORLD OF WORDS - AmyNikita

BOOKS.BAGS.BURGERS - Uma K

BOOK REVIEWS BY DI - Di Hewlett

Would you read a book that has no/few reviews?

Absolutely - it’s difficult for indie authors to get readers and to get those first few reviews in! I’ll especially pick up the book if it’s an author that I know and I am interested in the author/plot/premise/all of the above.

Ummmm it depends. I take other factors into account, too (like cover, whether it’s a debut author, etc) but,like Uma, I was definitely more willing to accept books with little or no reviews when I first started my blog. Now I’m more fussy, so I like to see at least a few reviews of the book to give me an idea whether it’s something I might enjoy.   

Do book covers matter?

As readers I think we can all be a bit superficial when it comes to book covers! I love pretty books! So if it’s an author I don’t know, a book I haven’t heard of before or if I'm browsing the library/bookstore - YES, the cover definitely matters because that’s what I see first and what first draws me to pick up the book and check out what it’s about. But that being said, if it’s a known author or something that’s being buzzed about then the cover doesn’t make a difference to me. For example there was a HUGE uproar about the latest Throne of Glass book cover, but honestly? It could have been plain black and only had the title and Sarah J Maas written on it and I would have bought it and read it and definitely loved it. The content matters the most.

I feel guilty saying this, but yes! I know, I know, you shouldn’t judge a book by it's cover, but let’s be honest, covers do influence whether we pick up a book or not, right? They definitely influence me. Of course, I have occasionally picked up a book - or accepted a review copy - where the cover hasn’t been that appealing but the premise really is. So I guess it comes to whether the premise outweighs the cover?

I don’t know. Covers do influence my decision to whether or not to read the book, but sometimes the premise overshadows it so completely that that is the deciding factor.  

Do series covers matter?

I like my series covers to match! I like to have the same series of pictures throughout, and for this reason I don’t like buying physical books until they’ve all been published. I mean, what if I owned the first three Game of Thrones covers all in their original edition covers and then I had to go and get the next one in a different cover set? I would be sad. It’s for this reason that I just prefer box sets. I’m just OCD like that.

Not particularly. I’m more concerned with the edition of one book, but I rarely think about the series as a whole. It’s nice if the covers match, but it’s not a big deal. I also don’t have an issue with publishers changing the covers halfway through the series - which I know annoys many other readers. But it doesn’t bother me.

Go over to their collab posts to know my answers!:

❤ Book Reviews by Di
❤ A Magical World of Words

We hope you’ve enjoyed the latest in our series of discussion posts! Please talk to us and let us know YOUR answers below. What do you think of our responses? If you have any specific questions you’d like us to address in the future, please let us know in the comments section below.