Guidelines

This is probably one of the most useless blogs to ever be created. I already know that !

The title is pretty self-explanatory as it is, I have read a book and why you ought to care for that ? I don't know ! Maybe you have nothing to do with your life expect reading lame blogs and therefore you should probably be working on this issue of yours instead of having your sense of worth consumed by uninspiring writings. Or maybe you're a random visitor who by guidance of the Great Powers of the Unknown settled on this somber zone of the wide internet, and then probably you should leave because you know, there are better things to do. And maybe you're someone who've heard of my project (already calling it a project! I just can't get more pretentious, can I) and you want to see what books I've read so far and what I do think of them, as though you really care of that, which of course, you don't. So please feel free to use the content of this blog as a basis to judge me and a record to read through and throughout my soul and sense of self-glorification. Or not.

Seriously (haha ..), this blog is yet another try of mine to penetrate the blogosphere, for I think it's really important and almost necessary for us -people who attempt to become better people and make a difference in their lives and lives of people around them- to step one step ahead of the typical consumer, and try to cross over to the world of creators, hopefully. Blogs being the easiest vehicle of ideas nowadays (and NOT Facebook, God forbid), I choose to start from here. I won't probably be making any difference on a global or a local level, and it's not my goal in all honesty, I know this to be exceptionally unexceptional, but it would mean something for .. me. It's a personal challenge and I owe myself this test, I owe myself to be convinced that I'm not that person who'll spend whole days of his precious and noway reimbursed life doing nothing but dull facebook errands and limitless Youtube dives instead of doing something that might actually nourish my soul and help me grow as a human, even if it's not that strong of a fertilizer. I hope this blog is something I can do and stay honest to and maybe one day be proud of.

I created this blog in tandem with promising myself to (1) stop using Facebook (and maybe Youtube) except for weekends and (2) reading a book a week. Not so easy for someone who, not too long ago, couldn't find 20 books to start up his Goodreads profile, which is shameful. I want to reboot my reading engine and aim (too?) high in order to make sense to myself, and hopefully stop my atrocious self-loathing cycle once for all.

So here is what to expect : 

• No exceptional reviewing abilities : If you want to read professional, really meaningful and mature book reviews, look for some Times articles. If you want to read some meager, biased, hardly intellectual reviews, then you're most welcomed.
• Rusty sense of humor : I'm pretty much self-aware about that. If you glimpsed a half-assed joke then please proceed as if nothing really happened, don't make it stop you from carrying on the reading because maybe .. maybe there are more half-assed jokes awaiting.
  Just get over it.
• Lack of objectivity and external bias : I'd be a liar if I said I would judge a book from a distance, objectively. I'm a person who gets emotionally involved in things, and I love to have opinions about them. What the others think is none of my business. So if you have recommended* a book and I shamelessly bashed it, then I'm not the one to blame, maybe you're the one to blame, maybe you are the one to blame for anything wrong with your life. You have some work to do, human failure.
• Eventual spoilers : I think it's too soon to promise that my reviews would be spoilers-free. I promise I won't intentionally ruin the reading experience for you by revealing any main plot devise or seminal event of the plot, but I can't help pointing out the things that I most liked (or hated for the same matter) about the book. It's a review, not a synopsis (Wikipedia is already there for that, although some untalented Wiki-editors aren't sharp enough to know that the synopsis stops before the events start, scumbags), so it should include plot-based arguments. The review would be constituted of two rough parts : The introduction (the intrigue) and the actual review. If you can't trust my sense of judgement of what's okay to be unveiled and what's not, you can skip the actual review and read just the "rating", the "Recommended for", and the "Book in a few words" sections. Then you can read the book spoiler-freely and come back for the review. Or don't. Just don't come back if you can't trust my sense (which any sane-minded person would do, quite frankly).

I fixed a few rules so I won't get lost in my self-drawn road. In order to diversify but also challenge myself, I would make the "next to read" procedure less arbitrary and more focused and rewarding. I choose the following pattern : 

1. A novel : There are many novels to be read, too many actually. And although they're all different to some extent, they tend to become a "pastime", more like "read this so I can review it and shake off this week's burden", which is not what I want to do, and knowing myself, I believe I'll end up doing it anyways. So I  choose to limit the novels that I choose to read myself for one per every cycle.
2. A Classic/Cult Classic : To read is a thing, to read Classics is another. Those are books that established the state of international "Classic" in their respective domains that they need to be read for many reasons. Scientific, historical, religious, autobiographical, revolutionary .. I'll pick up one classic each week and see whether, with my highly impaired judgement, this classic deserve this status for me (pretentiousness overload, get over it too). Cult classics are also an option that is more exclusive, but more worth experiencing.
3. A Non-Fiction : for the same reasons listed in 1, I won't restrain myself to novels and fiction books, as tempting as this actually is. They say that we read to escape from our disfigured reality and to reach  out for a more perfect sense-making world, which is quite true. But let's not forget that it's not the only reason to read. We read to grow and mature as humans, so we need to relate to our reality more often. Historical or scientific, documentary or didactic, I intend to learn too from this experience and there is A LOT to learn.
4. A Recommended : *New this season ! For every cycle, I'll read a book that is recommended by someone else as a Must-Read. I'll read it and review it regardless of what the "recommander" thinks of it. So it is safe to say that most of my bad ratings will be coming from this section. But I still love you, my loyal reader.
   
   PS : I wrote historical twice, but rest assured I don't mean it ! I won't be reading ANY historical books for now, that's as bad as .. reading historical books. Enough said.

For a typical review, it would include the following elements :

• Name / Writer / Publishing Year / Language ..
• Type :  From the four aforementioned possibilities : Novel, Classic, Non-Fiction, Recommended.
• How come ? How did I found the book and why did I choose it (just to remember later on how and why I first met that specific book and feel nostalgic about it and maybe start crying ..).
• Estimated time : For the busier among you (sure ..), this will help you determine whether you can read this book in the time span you have.
  Very practical and completely free. Just like water .. Wait.
• Themes : This is pretty essential. Here I'll try to sum up the issues the book address. That should be enough to know whether you would like it or not, basically.
• Recommended for : My modest estimation of the people the writer had in mind while writing the book (Ughh). It can be anything from "Everyone who has time to read", to "Anyone who can read" to "Only me. GET OFF THIS BOOK YOU DON'T DESERVE IT YOU FILTHY RAT!". Quite clear I guess.
• The book in a few words : If you don't want to read the book, I'll be of the great help to you and I'll offer you the essence, the heart and the soul of the books in as little words as possible, you won't even need to read it ! How cool is that ?
  Again, very practical and unconventionally free .. like love ! Love ..
• The synopsis : Here is the spoiler-free part of the review. It'll be more like summing up the first few pages, but maybe some of the late pages, or even the middle ones (no one cares for the middle ones, we just forget them, which is sad). The point is, this will prepare you, spoiler-freely, to what you'll find in this book and probably why you should read it.
• Rating : I ain't stydin' math for nothin' ! Here is the numerical representation of my appreciation of the book. It can range from 0.5 to 10. Of course most of my ratings would be 6 upwards because life is too short to read below average books AND review them, so I'll spare you dear follower this inconvenience and be the sole reader of those terrible books. All of this so you don't suffer, and you still insist on making yourself suffering, you ungrateful masochist.
  I know myself to be generous in ratings, and I never hesitate giving a fulfilling book the perfect 10/10 score and I don't regret it. I don't like the idea of being stingy when it comes to reviewing. But since this blog is ALL about rating and reviewing, I'll be more thorough, especially in the vicinity of 10. Because naturally most of the books I'll be reading are going to be Great with capital G (I'm hoping here), so I must give justice to excellence and as a logical consequence, I won't be giving too many 9s that I would normally love to give. As a reference, here as some rough lines : 5 is "not a total waste of time", 6 is "nice try", 7 is "deserves reading", 8 is "great", 9 is "awesome", and 10 is "WHY AREN'T YOU READING IT RIGHT NOW YOU TASTELESS POTATO".
  So yeah, 10 are going to be rare.
• THE Review : Self-explanatory. Here I'll talk about the book, what I noticed on both positive and negative sides. The total rating will give you a clear idea about the weight of each. I might focus on the imperfections for the books I like most because they were near perfect, while bringing the good sides of the more 7-ish books as an apology and a "could be better if" comment. THE review will be biased and very subjective.
• Favorite passages/characters : Not because you care which ones were my favorites, but because I do.

I guess that's all.

I hope you enjoy !