About Book Bloggers (And a List!)
Reedsy is pretty reliable regarding most book-related lists. I used its list of writing competitions when I fell into the trap of entering contests (stupid decision), and I find the site to be trustworthy. That's huge in the writing world, because so many sites are, frankly, full of shit, or they just create lists to try to sell an author something they're affiliated with.
Don't ask me how I got entangled in asking book bloggers to review my book. The exercise is about as useful as entering book contests. And even if one of them agrees to review Running From Herself, would it do me any good? Plus, from perusing their blogs, that's a big IF in the first place.
It's funny how most of these blogs started out as a lark; just something an avid reader took a stab at doing, and their origin stories are very humble and self-effacing; but after a while, the bloggers turned grumpy and dictatorial. They have a long list of things they WON'T accept, WON'T do; plus very specific REQUIREMENTS for submitting, and a caveat that they're NOT GOING TO just slap a positive review online, so if you don't like it, DON'T submit to them.
Oh. Okay. Geez, calm down!
Maybe they hadn't counted on getting inundated with submissions, and they suddenly realized what they'd gotten themselves into, and now they're all stressed out because tons of books are landing on their (virtual) doorstep every day. To that I say, just close yourself to submissions, dumbass. Many of the bloggers I researched have done just that. Simple solution.
Going through Reedsy's list, I clicked on every blog that listed contemporary fiction as a genre they accept. I'm all done with the whole women's fiction moniker; that's a total loser in so many ways. And I'm partial to the blogs that employ a website form for submissions. Composing a cloying email to try to convince them to review me is cringeworthy. I did a few yesterday, though. Desperation drives one to do things that are against their nature.
A big drawback I noticed with many of the blogs is that they have no submission section; at least not one that can be found. It could their subtle way of saying they're not accepting submissions, but then, just say that, instead of making an author comb through every section of your blog to try to suss out a way to submit. I'm honestly not there to learn everything there is to know about you. Sorry, but it's true. Any author who claims otherwise is lying. And I'm not there to buy any of your other services or browse your recipes (yes, one blogger seems more interested in her baking endeavors than in reviewing books). I clicked out of a bunch of blogs because I couldn't find a way to submit.
Then there are the pay-to-play ones. Reedsy, I'm disappointed in you. Paid reviewers can be found virtually everywhere. There was one, though, that was sort of interesting and inexpensive; it included a list of its reviewers to choose from, but only one guy reviews contemporary fiction, and his word count limit is 110,000. Oops, that rules me out. I was disappointed, because he sounded like a good fit.
In all, I've probably contacted five bloggers so far, and I'm mostly through Reedsy's entire list. The number would have been higher, but as I noted, many blogs apparently don't want to bother with submissions. Of the five, all said in essence that if I don't hear from them in a couple of days, they're not interested. Based on my track record of success, how many do you think I'll hear back from? 😀 It's probably for the best; I'm leery of reviews in the first place, which is why I never bothered with ARCs.
In the end, it simply gives me something to do with my time. Lord knows I'm running out of options.
Here are some links to book blogger lists:
Reedsy's Best Book Review Blogs in 2025
List of Book Review Blogs: Where to Find Them
Kindlepreneur's Ultimate List of the Best Book Review Blogs
BookSiren's (All) Book Reviewers
Detailed's The 50 Best Book Blogs of 2025
The Definitive Book Blogger List
Shirley's Book Blogger List (links only ~ no detailed summaries provided)
Midwest Book Review's "Other Book Reviewers" (not vetted by me)
Complete Review (again, I have not vetted)
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