I’ve been blogging about anime, manga and related subjects for about nine years this month. I started on Wordpress.com and then moved to my own domain after seven months. At first, I wrote about news happenings and weekly episodes of Haruhi and Welcome to the NHK but then transitioned to more analytical posts at a less frequent update rate.
Despite how long I’ve been writing and occasionally getting review or press inquiries through emails, I don’t consider myself to be a big-name blogger. I’m not sure if I would want that distinction but I would like to interact more with my readers and other bloggers (a thought I expressed in a post looking back at older anime blogs) since I have sometimes felt like I’m writing into a void.
So I was interested in reading Lauren Orsini‘s new digital book Build Your Anime Blog (currently US $5.99 on Kindle Store), partly to get some advice on how to improve as a blogger but also to learn more about how fellow bloggers got started and continue to write.
Lauren begins the book with her own experiences in blogging and explains how to set up your own blog from technical and other standpoints. As I read the first section, I started to think about the voice & personality of this blog. It’s something I hadn’t given much thought before now. I suppose it’s an extension of my own personality – reflective and being interested in unconventional takes on things.
Nigorimasen! doesn’t really have an identifiable focus like spinoff blog Sport in Fiction (sports anime, manga, movies, etc.) has so that’s something for me to develop and refine to make it stand out more. An important thing I need to do with both blogs is to write posts on a more consistent basis.
The other three-quarters of the book concerns twelve interviews with anime bloggers. I was familiar with some of the interviewed bloggers and even met a few in person (Evan of Ani-Gamers and Kate & Al of Reverse Thieves) at conventions over the years while some others I hadn’t heard of before. It was interesting to read how each got started in different ways and their advice to aspiring/beginning bloggers.
I liked Build Your Anime Blog because it reminded me that I still have room to improve and it gave me a boost of confidence that I can achieve some personal writing goals. Sure, I could have probably gotten those two things from reading a well-written blog post as well but I feel like collecting these varied voices into one book that you can recommend to someone who isn’t already deeply connected to the anime/manga blogging community, either as a writer or as a reader, is laudable.
Even if you don’t check out the book, please do sample other blogs to see what they’re writing about or how their styles might differ from what you currently read.
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Tom, thank you once again for reviewing Build Your Anime Blog. I’m so glad you found it helpful!
I think when it comes to how anibloggers continue on writing is that many actually gain encouragement from fellow anibloggers. Once you are pretty active more anibloggers usually take notice and that is when you interact by visiting each other’s blogs. It makes one feel like a big anime fan community but something more special. An anime blogging community.
I am so happy to hear you would love to interact with your readers more! I have also been wanting that too but think what is causing the void like you mentioned is lack of consistent blogging consistency. Think so too. I would love to see more content when possible.