ON BOOKS ~ Your Passion...

I was on vacation last week and so I didn't get to tag along in the book blogosphere's big award/networking week aka BBAW aka Book Blogger Appreciation Week. But I did check in upon my return and saw that a couple hundred of you actively participated at one point or another and I got such a warm fuzzy feeling when I saw lots of bloggers involved who I have come to know over the last two years.

Blogging is generally the result of a passion that needs to be expelled. That doesn't sound quite right, but it is the best I can do. People who are searching for a cure to a loved one's disease blog until their fingers are numb to spread the word and try to gain information. Shutterbugs need to post photo after photo to share the moments their eyes have captured with their lens and seek other images to knock their socks off. Bookies are driven to read, and to keep those thoughts trapped in their heads would cause massive insanity so they blog it out via reviews, literary games, conversational debates involving the industry and sharing the love via giveaways - feeding the forever toppling To Be Read pile.

I am always amazed by those of you who wrangle multiple blogs of passion. I just try to cram a bunch of passionate snippets into this here blog of ours like a pu-pu-platter mostly because I am too lazy to serve up proper courses. My Blog Buddy, Jehara, is a very passionate blogger. While I was lounging around on vacation she was busy launching her new dedicated book blog. You see, her original blog became overrun with the passions of living and her thoughts on food, yoga, marriage and the world around her. Reading about such interesting things made her want to write about how they related to her personally in her life and before she knew it, she had left little room to blog about the books themselves. And this made her sad. Books are her passion - they spur on so many other great loves. Rather than be a lazy Bumble, she was a motivated Jehara and created an entirely new blog just for her bookish passion.

This transfer of posts from one blog to another took a lot of time and effort. Not to mention the commitment. Which is what proves how passionate she is about it all. When I came back from vacation, I was thrilled to see her hard work become a reality as she launched her new book blog, quirky girl reads. She's rewarding visitors with baubles for bibliophiles and I do encourage you to stop on by. In the wake of BBAW. In the spirit of a shared passion. Or even if you just like to win free stuff. That's OK too. But mostly go because she is passionate about books. And you are too. It's almost enough to inspire a book blog out of this Bumble. Then again, when would I have time to play fantasy football?

If you would like to chat about how you decide to follow or drop blogs and how you write or read book reviews, join in our first Bumble Town Chat this coming Friday night at 8:30PM ET right here on our blog. Let us know if you plan to attend :0)