We all have a favorite or memorable book. Old and worn out, it can be a native, like a man. It will give advice, comfort, and it is with it that we are warm and cozy. Some people enjoy the book alone, others like to share their own perceptions of the work of art, encouraging others to get positive emotions from reading. Oleksandra Martynenko, an avid reader and a sincere amateur literary critic, shared with Zhytomyr.Travel the importance of books in her own life and the peculiarities of running a book blog
«I have had a love of reading all my life. As a child, my parents actively read to me, and at the age of five I learned to read on my own. My first books were illustrated fairy tales, they still remain with me. The book The Wizard of Oz made a special impression on me, I read it constantly, and the book became a table book for me. On my ninth birthday, I was presented with the Guinness Book of World Records, which I adored. I also loved encyclopedias, thanks to which it was possible to learn many exceptional facts. I liked to analyze what I read, that’s why I had a large number of encyclopedias about nature, history»
«In fifth grade, I read Harry Potter for the first time, and the first and second books in just one day, and then I fell in love with the story so much that even now I’m collecting books and everything related to it great magical world. And at this time I got acquainted with the work of Vsevolod Nestayko «Toreadors from Vasyukivka», and this book started my love for Ukrainian literature»
«I like to read everything, but there are also favorite authors. One of them is Stephen King, in particular such works as «11/22/63», «Entertainment Country», «Green Mile», «Pet Cemetery», «Shining». I love Dan Brown’s books: «Angels and Demons», «Inferno», «The Da Vinci Code». I like Neil Gaiman, his «Good Heralds», «Carolina». I often re-read the romantic books of Jojo Moyes, I have a collection of almost all of her works. When I entered the university, I began to read a lot of economic and psychological literature. In my freshman year, I bought Ha Yun Chang’s book «Economics: Instructions for Use», and I have many notes and bookmarks in it. I have been rereading it for more than several years in a row, thanks to this book it becomes much easier to understand economics as a science»
«Books for me are not just a source of knowledge. With the help of literary works you can analyze certain events that occur in life, to draw important conclusions for yourself. A book is a separate world in which you can abstract from all the problems you have in the outside world, forget about things and enjoy»
«I like to reread books. For example, before Christmas I read «Harry Potter» – in the first books there is a very nice New Year’s atmosphere. When you reread a book, you notice details that you haven’t noticed before. I read not only in Ukrainian, but also in English or Russian. The work in the original always gives you the opportunity to find something new for yourself. I often reread the works of Mykhailo Bulgakov, Niccolo Machiavelli, Patrick Suskind, Ray Bradbury, Franz Kafka, Albert Camus. I don’t like to reread only detectives, because I already know the solution – «who is the killer?», Or «who is the thief?». However, sometimes I can reread Sherlock Holmes, because it’s a classic»
«I don’t read e-books at all – I don’t like it. I like to pick up a book, feel its cover, its smell. You can enjoy a printed book by looking at the beautiful design – illustrations, making notes, emphasizing important information»
«If the book is very interesting, I can stay up and read all evening. And then there will be an «aftertaste» when I analyze it for a few days. Sometimes I can read several books in a row, but most of the time I try to read a book in one day, because I’m very impatient – I want to know how it will end. I count the books I have read, I have a list where I indicate the title of the book, the author, my impressions and evaluate it on a five-point scale»
«I have a very positive attitude to the film adaptation of works. Many people first watch a movie and then read a book. I had this with Andy Weir’s «Martian», when I watched the film and immediately bought the book. It is interesting to compare the opinion of the author and the perception of the director. I really like the film adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s «Portrait of Dorian Gray», it corresponds to what I imagined reading the book. Much depends on the director, on his understanding and perception. Sometimes the film can be interesting, but if the director «ran through the book», the film will fail»
«I once started to maintain a book page. I actively posted a large number of reviews, in which I told readers about whether I liked the book or not, why. I have also published many posts with book challenges: it used to be very popular to compose books like a rainbow, to tell about your favorite books of a certain genre, or to present them in alphabetical order. In general, book Instagram is a very interesting area and a bit unpredictable, because there is always something new»
«Even before I came to the book Instagram, I followed other bloggers, so I knew how to communicate with the audience, keep in touch with them, who needs to take pictures, take the right photos. I did not lose my passion, because I understood: they could, and I can. And so it turned out that in a few months I was able to get closer to their level, my opinion also began to be appreciated»
«We had our own community – book clubs that were involved in the development of book Instagram in Ukraine. We shared our impressions of the works, participated in challenges, presented creative photographs on specific topics, symbolizing the book or the author. We had a book exchange in the process of which we gave each other books. During the four years of the blog’s existence, I published about 1,500 posts about books, 300 posts about challenges and another 200 – these were my stories about TV series and movies. There were 4,500 like-minded people on the blog. In fact, I was not chasing quantity, but quality. I actively wrote about fiction, anti-utopia, economic and psychological literature, made special selections of books of a certain genre or subject. People learned my opinion about a lot of books»
«Why did I start a blog with reviews? I wanted to tell people that reading is cool and important, that reading expands the worldview, you enrich the language – you learn new words. I published posts and drafted stories every day. This hobby brought me pleasure, I was happy to communicate with subscribers, exchange views with them about books, movies, TV series. It was very nice to receive active feedback from them – people wrote their own reviews, which was very inspiring»
«My first post was about Patrick Suskind’s Perfumer. When I received a list of literature for 11th grade, I decided to read this book. I liked it so much that it was from it that I started blogging. I hardly received any feedback from the post, as it was the first. However, I did not expect anything – ten likes were already happiness for me. At first I was supported by friends, they signed up for a profile and interacted with posts. Only from the post of the fifteenth did the activity appear and the audience came»
«At that time, I actively cooperated with publishing houses. They sent me books by barter, for reviews. It was very gratifying that they did not want to hear a purely positive opinion – it was important for them that the opinion was objective. If you don’t like it – explain why, but the main task is to tell the world about it so that people know about the existence of the book. Today, very high quality books are published in Ukraine – creative design and excellent translation. Almost a year after blogging, I decided to try to write to Vivat publishing house with a proposal for cooperation. Later, they wrote to me that they agreed because they saw activity on my page and sent me the first two books. I was very happy, because it was a new experience. I reviewed these books and received positive feedback from the publisher. They also really liked the photos, which thematically and symbolically corresponded to the book. Then I started working with the online store «Yakaboo» and was extremely happy about it, because I could not think that it could be possible for a small book blog. At that time, they were hosting a yakaboo book challenge, where they had to read books and complete tasks every month. For the best performance we received book gifts»
«I believe that a book Instagram needs its own idea, individual approach, style. You need to understand that you are going to write reviews that people should accept: these are essays with voluminous, clear and interesting text. The ability to take photos plays an important role in blogging. The book must be able to be depicted correctly, choose an interesting angle, the photo must be of high quality. It is important to understand that you will actively communicate with readers. You can’t just publish a post and be silent – you need to actively share your book life in instastories. In addition, I talked in my blog about movies and TV series. It all combined and looked very harmonious»
«There were cases when the audience did not agree with the opinion I expressed in the post. For example, in a review of Stephen King’s book «The Land of Entertainment». I wrote that I really liked it because it has a fascinating and unpredictable plot. People wrote in the comments that they did not like the work. I asked what exactly influenced their impressions, we actively engaged in dialogue and discussed this topic. This is interesting because everyone has different tastes, and this must be taken into account»
«At the moment I have a so-called «stop». I actively developed my book blog for four years, and stopped running it due to the heavy workload – study and work. I don’t have time to read much physically. If earlier I could read 15-20 books a month, now I can’t read for months. A reboot is required. Maybe I’ll start all over again, because I have experience, so I can do it again. The main thing is that someone needs it»
