Regular readers of this blog are probably mad at me — and for good reason. We went on an unplanned hiatus for the past month: no posts went up, no books were reviewed, and no mention was made of where we went. Readers noticed and let us know through comments and emails that they wanted more PostScript.
There isn’t a fancy explanation, other than I was really busy and a teeny bit burned out. This blog isn’t really a sales driver for my shop (Church Street Coffee & Books). It’s more of a labor of love. Our writers and I do this blog because we like writing, we love our readers, and we think it’s important to create as much discussion about books as we can. But sometimes life gets away from us, and I didn’t want to just put up a bunch of filler posts — that seems like doing a disservice to our readers. Our goal is to discuss books in a constructive, intelligent, or fun way, and I’d rather take a break from posting altogether than put up posts that don’t meet that standard.
It’s a pet peeve of mine to read posts where a blogger writes, “I’m busy now but I promise I’ll be back soon,” mostly because, more often than not, they never come back. I didn’t know when we’d be able to regroup and come back to the blog, and I didn’t want to promise something we couldn’t deliver, so I chose to say nothing until I had something to say. Now that we’ve returned with posts from last week and this one, I feel more comfortable explaining what happened in the meantime. And it does mean a lot to hear from those of you who missed us, and to be reminded that this blog matters to our readers. It’s important to me, and it’s important to our writers, too.
In the next few weeks and months, we’re going to be retooling the blog, shaping it into something we hope you’ll love even more. We’re keeping the book recommendations and hoping to add some more about our other love (coffee!). We’re coming up with new ideas for posts that we can keep up with to bring back the consistency that our readers came to expect. As with all changes, I’m sure there will be bumps along the way, and I’m sure there will be other weeks with nothing but radio silence — but just know we’re still here, we’re working on it, and we’re planning for new ways to keep the content coming.
Thanks in advance for your forgiveness, and thanks to our writers (especially Mollie, Kelly and Carla Jean) who kept sending me material even when I wasn’t able to get it published. Here’s to the future of our humble little book blog, and to a love of reading!
Carrie Rollwagen is book buyer and co-owner at Church Street Coffee & Books, an independent bookstore and coffee shop in Birmingham, Alabama.