Dear friend, thank you so much for joining me on the 5 year anniversary of Armed with A Book. When I started the website all those years back, all I knew was that I was going to write about books. I didn’t know who was going to read it or that I would start to get books from publishers and authors. I didn’t know that I would make best friends with a fellow voracious reader and we would write monthly wrap ups and discuss books here. My website has grown in unimaginable ways and on this milestone of completing five years, I am going to take the opportunity to look at the big picture and take us on a short journey of the highlights over the past years.
From the First Books to Now: The 5 year Journey
There are certain books I attribute to my growth as a writer and a blogger. Though pre-blog, I wrote about some books on Goodreads, the first book I ever reviewed with the mindset of it being a new beginning was Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi in May 2019. The next important book (and second review) is What we see in the smoke by Ben Berman Ghan because it is the first time I wondered if I could interview an author. Ben was gracious to take a chance on a new blogger and he gave me the confidence to reach out for interviews, whether I get them or not. The then Twitter community opened me up to book tours and my first tour was Stephen Zimmer‘s Prowling the Darkness through Tomorrow Comes Media. An important milestone in reviewing is when one posts (should they choose to) their first negative review. That was The Gilded King for me. The first ever buddy read and discussion, personally and on the blog, was The Farm with Ariel.
Sometimes, I have also given you a glimpse of my non-bookish life. Ending my education and final teaching practicum was a bittersweet moment. I don’t know how many of my students actually read A Letter To My Grade 9s: Celebrating Success, but I am glad the blog chronicles some of the pivotal personal moments too.
In the span of eight months, I had immersed myself in the bookish communities, started taking review requests and making connections with Indie and traditionally published authors. I still remember the first time I received a stack of books from a publisher in the mail. I was on the moon! The WriteHive community has been a huge part of my blogging life and I continue to be a book blogger in residence there. I have made so many friends. It is lovely to think about how many of those 2019 friendships are still around. I ended 2019 on a high note, hosting 20 readers in the 2019 in Books for Book Lovers series.
That’s all from the first year of being out of university, starting a full-time job and the blog. It is exhilarating to see how many years it’s been and how far I have come. Here are the highlights of the rest of the years:
2020
I started 2020 with co-hosting Armed with A Bingo reading challenge with Ariel. Through blog tours I learned to host authors for guest posts. If I wanted to interview someone or learn from them, I didn’t need to read the book. This led to the launch of The Creator’s Roulette series in January 2020. I remember designing the wheel with my best friend, Laur. This was also the year I started to enjoy Instagram and taking photos of books.
The Bookstaswiftiesfolklore Challenge from August 2020 was the first time I combined a bunch of interests – books, photography and music.
2021
This was the year Ariel and I discovered our love for horror through the Horror a Month challenge. I started working more closely with indie authors and highlighting their favorites through the Indie Recommends Indie series and later in the year, book excerpts with interviews.
2022
Ariel and I tried our hand at reading Romance every month but it was not the genre for us. With my wedding and travels, this was a slow year. I didn’t focus as much on the blog but collaborations continued and after everything, I came back with renewed energy. I can’t emphasize how important and helpful that break was.
Celebrating Taylor Swift’s Midnight album with the #MIDNIGHTSBOOKCHALLENGE, I shared 13 books that have kept me awake till midnight.
After reading Your Writing Matters, I decided to personally track writing better and it has been a lot of fun to see all I have read, what to read, what to review, what needs to be reread to review. Maybe I will write about it one day.
2023
I put myself out there more and connected one-on-one with authors. I got my first appearance in author Lindsey Bakken’s newsletter and we regularly collaborate on the newsletter, blog and Instagram since. The idea of Barbie In Book Characters came from her.
I had reflected about reading in early years of blogging and I decided to come back to it in a more structured manner. I curated The Transformative Power Of 5 Creativity Books and started the TBR Tales series.
In August, I had some blog theme issues for the first time and I came out of it knowing more about best practices. It was also clear to me how hard it can be to pursue a hobby in a world where I rely on companies whose goal is profit.
I created my own challenge in 2023 – Taylor Swift Bookish November. I never got around to posting about it on the blog but you can find all the posts on my Instagram and Facebook.
2024
Here we are in 2024! Ariel and I launched our very first Armed with A Book Choice Awards. I am enjoying sharing new upcoming releases each month with you. Author and editor, Allison Alexander started featuring us in her Editor’s Alchemy newsletter.
Favorite Writings in 5 years
Books and their reviews
These books led to some great times while writing their review.
My favorite bookish articles
Being vulnerable is part of blogging and going beyond a specific book takes more courage for me. Over the years I have done many bookish compilations and reflections on the blog.
- How Was The Book? – Describing The Reading Experience came out of discussion with many friends and the system of rating books on eight categories is one both Ariel and I still use today. It was my first step away from star ratings and accepting the subjectivity of reading. I have been trying to formalize the one I use for non-fiction.
- I didn’t know anything about trigger warnings when I first started blogging and I owe everything to the WriteHive community who helped me understand this. The practice of including content notes in reviews came from this exercise and I am so happy to see it stick.
- I wrote Author-reviewer relationships with Kota a year into book blogging when I was frustrated with social media interactions. Even today, I recommend all authors who send me a review request to read it and think about how they can foster a positive connection with strangers they are reaching out to to read their book.
- I am proud of all of my TBR Tales articles. Dealing With DNF: The Practice Of Did Not Finish and How to read more are closest to my heart because I shared very personal practices in these.
What are the next 5 years going to look like?
Armed with A Book is here to stay! In all these years of having the blog, I have learned how much I love books and writing. I want to keep these hobbies. I want to keep making connections with authors and readers.
As I grow older, you will see me post about different kinds of books and experiences. I already do. Maybe you noticed the books on grief?
Shoutouts
There are many people who keep Armed with A Book going with their continued interest in books and me.
Biggest thank you to Ariel, I love sharing this space with you and I don’t know what I was doing before our first chat.
Next biggest to my husband, Clinton, for occasionally helping me decide which book to read and marvelling at the number of books I read in a month.
Thanks Papa, Amma and Abu who encouraged reading when I was young. Amma and Abu, I miss reading with you.
Lots of love to my mom, Ranjana, who knows how I much I stress about my hobby, my step-mom, Treena, who named this blog and tells me about the books she reads, and my mom-in-law, Stacey, who doesn’t miss an opportunity to tell people about the blog. I love discussing books with all three of you and my TBR is longer because of you.
Thank you SK for being there for me especially when I have author dilemmas. I love getting your wisdom and telling you all my highlights. It is an honor to see the reading experience on IndieStoryGeek and the amazing community your website has built.
Huge thanks to Kota and Jerusha for being awesome and my friends.
Thank you to Lindsey, Allison and Kota for thinking my blog is newsletter worthy.
To Dani Finn for letting me add art to their books.
A huge thanks to all my friends, authors and strangers who chat books with me.
I am excited to see what the next five years bring. Thank you for being on this journey with me and joining me on this reflection on the 5 year anniversary of the blog!
You will always find me at armedwithabook.com and various social media sites – X, Facebook, Instagram, BlueSky.
Happy Anniversary!