As a bibliophile on the Fediverse, I’m flailing a little. I’m on Mastodon, Lemmy, and BookWyrm.social, but I don’t know which is the best place to reach the largest and most active number of fellow readers.

Currently I’m guessing that this is the largest book group in the Fediverse, based entirely on MAU - but I’ll be frank, I could easily be wrong.

I’m looking to discuss approaches to reviewing books. It occurred to me recently that the most meaningful and helpful reviews are the ones that tie in to emotion - that emotional impact is by far the most important aspect of art and writing, at least to me. I’m curious to hear what sort of approaches others have tried, and maybe sharing tips.

There’s also another issue that’s been bothering the hell out of me: BookSNS. It’s a book recommendation site that’s very active, with a lot of users. I’ve been following it for quite a while via Mastodon.

Posts from it are echoed or relayed to Mastodon, but replies don’t go the other way. Users there seem to think that they are posting on Reddit, at least some of the time. But there is no way to contact anyone at the website itself; no admin address, and you have to have an account there in order to respond on the site. But there are no openings for new accounts.

It drives me completely crazy, because I have a huge amount of experience recommending books - particularly older books. I used to be one of the top book recommenders on Reddit, before I walked away after their IPO sleaze. Over and over I’ve seen requests for recommendations for which I have the perfect answers, only to find myself absolutely unable to respond.

It’s torture. I really love recommending the books that I know, particularly since almost no one else seems to even be aware of their existence. But I just can’t get through to those requesters.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

#Books #BookSNS #Mastodon

  • njm1314@lemmy.world
    2·
    5 days ago

    I think going around looking for the largest or beat place is actually self-defeating. You just start talking about it somewhere, preferably here, and hope it grows. That’s how specialty communities work. The content doesn’t follow the users the users follow the content.

  • Okokimup@lemmy.world
    3·
    6 days ago

    Idk but if you find out, let me know. The book suggestion subreddut was the hardest one for me to walk away from, because I love recommending books, and I found much of my TBR from threads there.

    • BobQuasit@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      3·
      6 days ago

      How is BookWyrm doing these days?

      Pretty good, but it definitely needs some of the functionality of GoodReads! There just isn’t enough social interaction there. Without that, it’s kind of stuck in a quiet place.

  • causepix@lemmy.ml
    2·
    6 days ago

    I think you’re the perfect person to start a book discussion/ recommendations comm. It’ll take time to grow it, but with your background it shouldn’t be difficult to pull in new followers.

    I’m not a big reader, especially of fiction, but I’d definitely drop you a follow just to see your recommendations!

    • BobQuasit@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      1·
      3 days ago

      I tried setting one up on Mastodon with Guppe Groups, but it plunked into the void and was never seen again. I should probably try a different approach. Maybe a group on Lemmy?

      • causepix@lemmy.ml
        1·
        2 days ago

        Oh yeah, I don’t know anything about mastodon personally. As for Lemmy, it looks like beehaw restricts community creation to admins (see here), so you’ll have to find another instance to host it. I’d recommend an instance other than lemmy.world just for the sake of decentralization, but it’s really up to you. Wherever you host it, I’m pretty sure you’ll be able to moderate from your same beehaw account.

        Literature.cafe already has !bookrecs@literature.cafe that you could try to revive

        lemmyverse.net is a good place to explore instances if you want to see your options in terms of community creation. reddthat.com looks pretty agreeable, just to throw something out there, but you might have other preferences so definitely shop around!

        !newcommunities@lemmy.world has some advice posted and will be a good spot to post a spotlight once you’re up and running

        !communitypromo@lemmy.ca is another spot you can promo

        @Blaze@sopuli.xyz I know you’re pretty engaged with this topic. Are you able to impart any knowledge on this aspiring community founder?

  • moonshadow@slrpnk.net
    2·
    6 days ago

    I have nothing useful to say here, but you seem cool and I’d love a book recommendation :) typically enjoy speculative fiction, “The Dispossessed” is an all time fave, open to whatever though

    • BobQuasit@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      1·
      3 days ago

      Well, I just wrote and posted a review of Everything for Everyone on BookWyrm.social and copied it here (and on my Mastodon account). I’m an older reader, and I preferred older books even when I was a child. So many of the books reviewed on my BookWyrm account are pre-1980 or so. That said, there are a lot of wonderful old books - including many in the public domain - which are really worth reading!

    • BobQuasit@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      2·
      3 days ago

      I’d follow you here, but I can’t figure out how! I’m not seeing an option to follow on your profile.

      • Alas Poor Erinaceus@lemmy.mlEnglish
        1·
        3 days ago

        I don’t think Lemmy has that option, and anyway, I’m not sure I’m worth following, but thanks for the thought . . .