My Blog is 2 Years Old!

July marks a big milestone for me: It’s been two years since I restarted my website and started blogging. It’s been an adventure!

I’ll be honest—at first, I didn’t know what I was going to do with a blog. It came as part of the website package, and while I’ve always been a writer, I had no idea what to do with a blog. I write fiction, and to me, a blog was meant for…something else. I didn’t know what.

I didn’t post regularly for months. I didn’t know what to post, and those early pieces were largely promotional. I was planning to release Hunted at the time, and was working toward breaking my trilogy free from its former publisher’s hold. I didn’t post about the trilogy-publisher dilemma at all back then; it didn’t seem the proper channel, and I didn’t want to use my blog as a place to vent about it. I’d rather keep things positive.

I learned during that time that most readers aren’t that interested in promos if that’s all you’re going to post. Occasionally is fine, but you’ve got to have more content, new content to keep their attention.

So, at the end of 2020, I decided I’d start posting weekly. It forced me to come up with topics, and surprisingly, the more I did for the blog, the easier it became to think of the next post. I wasn’t expecting that outcome, but as they say, “practice makes perfect.” Or at least in this case, it makes the blogging aspect of my authoring business easier. I don’t think it’ll ever be “perfect.”

I started by writing some character profiles for The Caein Legacy, the series I was querying at the time. I released a few excerpts, too. I started getting a bit of traction.

But my blog didn’t really start getting noticed until I started posting book reviews. While I knew other authors are usually grateful for a review, previous to the blog, I’d only leave mine on Amazon. In my attempt to bolster my posting, I decided to also share those reviews on my blog.

That was a bit of a game-changer. People started interacting with me due to the reviews, and I made a number of amazing contacts. I’ve also had requests from others to read and review their books, and that’s been a lot of fun. I’ve found some great reads that way!

If you’re interested in what books I enjoy to read/review, you can take a look at my previous reviews here: Book Reviews. If you have a book you think I may be interested in, feel free to contact me: Contact AJ.

Beyond book-related stuff, I’ve posted a number of blogs in my Tales from the Lab series. For those new to my blog, I’m a microbiologist by day, and that series focuses on some odd/humorous stories from that aspect of my life. A few of my science-minded friends and former coworkers seem to enjoy those posts.

I haven’t been adding to that series much over the past six months, as I’m running out of interesting stories, but if you’d like to read any of the past posts, they’re available here: Tales from the Lab.

But what I find the most interesting – and what I’m most grateful for – is that people actually want to read my blog. It’s become more than just a tool, it’s a place where I can share some of the things I have going on in my life (whether writing-related or not), and people are genuinely interested. I never expected that when I started this experiment. I mean, I hoped for it, but to actually see it happen is pretty amazing.

Anyway, what I’m trying to say to all of you reading this is: THANK YOU.

Thank you for taking an interest in me, in my writing, in my nonsense stories from the lab, in the books I enjoy. Thank you for being here, and thank you for making this author thing worthwhile. It means more to me than you realize. Thank you.

While the past two years have been a bit of a struggle at times, this has been a great experience so far, and I couldn’t have done it with out you, the readers.