2019 Blog Stats Year in Review

On By angeliquejamailIn blogLeave a comment

Hello again! For those of you who are interested in such things, here is my annual round-up of some of my blog’s more interesting stats for the past year.

I’ve been writing this blog since August of 2011. When I began it, my intention was to post once a week. That worked for a while, until it didn’t because I was busy writing books and also raising kids who weren’t all that tiny anymore. Life got more busy with my day job and my family and my manuscripts and my author appearances. No complaints, but of course it meant I wasn’t producing as much new content on the blog as I would have liked.

Still, I persisted.

I have found over the years that series are especially popular here, and the most popular by far has always been the Poem-A-Day I curate in April for National Poetry Month. Other most viewed posts this year included my review of my Moss Wood Writing Retreat experience and Witchy Weekends — which this year saw a new format for me, an ongoing story told in weekly installments.

Most people found my blog this past year (as has probably always been the case) through Google searches, but a whole lot of readers come via WordPress, Facebook, and Twitter. This year I’m going to experiment more with Instagram and see if that can become a place where readers can find the blog as well.

Readers in 2019 came from dozens of countries, but the biggest audience is in the US. No surprise there, since that’s where I’m based, too, and I’m writing this blog in English. Usually the next biggest audience is either in UK or Canada, but this year India beat them both out! I think that’s because in I included a poem by Kabir Das in my aforementioned Poem-A-Day series this year, and that post gets a lot of traffic on a regular basis.

My views in 2019 were way more than in 2018. In 2018, the site had almost 6,000 hits, and in 2019, I enjoyed closer to 10,000. I like that trend. I will continue to write more here if more people are reading the posts — and especially commenting on them. One way this will help shape the content here is by telling me which of the three dozen books I completed on my 2019 Reading Year in Review list you want commentary on.

Another way is to just post in the comments something you’d like me to write about. I’m open to most topics, if I know (or can learn) anything about them. What are you interested in reading about here?

Thank you, as always, for reading this blog and being part of the emerging community here. Sappho’s Torque is gaining new subscribers regularly, and I never take that for granted.

Have a wonderful new year!

*****

Want to read more of my writing that’s already published? Click here for poetry, click here for urban fantasy, and click here for realistic flash fiction. You can also buy my books in Houston at Blue Willow Bookshop, and I hope you will!  🙂

2019 Reading Year in Review

On By angeliquejamailIn 2019, books, fiction, literature, non-fiction, poetry, reading12 Comments

Would you like to know what I’ve been reading the last twelve months? I made a list.

As I have done for the past few years, in 2019 I kept a list of the books I read. Generally books I read only for fun and not for school, but sometimes they crossed over. I realized a while back I just wasn’t reading enough for pleasure, and that was making my life, well, much less pleasurable. Reading has always been a vigorous Continue reading “2019 Reading Year in Review” →

12 Days of Seasonal Earworms You Need Right Now (Day 12)

On By angeliquejamailIn Christmas, Ella Fitzgerald, holidays, music, winter1 Comment

Well, my friends, we have arrived, finally, at the 12th day of holiday music. I hope you have enjoyed the series this year; there are already several excellent choices on the docket waiting for next year’s edition. Remember, too, you can click back through to see the playlists from the last several years right here:

2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018

I have Dean Martin’s smarmy version of this song on my iPod, but now that I’ve discovered this one, I have a feeling it’s going to be replaced. I really like this song: winter has always been “snuggle weather” as far as I’m concerned — and yes, I recognize my great good fortunate privilege to be able to say that, and I don’t take it for granted. Ella Fitzgerald’s gorgeous rendition makes me want to dance, dance, dance.

Have a wonderful holiday, whichever one you’re celebrating, if you are doing so, and if you aren’t, have a great week! I am celebrating myself, so expect me to be off the blog for a little while as I take a well-deserved vacation from All The Things. I’ll catch you toward the new year.

12 Days of Seasonal Earworms You Need Right Now (Day 11)

On By angeliquejamailIn Christmas, holidays, Louis Armstrong, music, Santa1 Comment

We are almost at the end of our 12 Days of Seasonal Earworms, and I was reminded of this song this year at my son’s holiday music concert at school. I hadn’t heard it in about a million years because Houston’s Pathetic Christmas Music Station doesn’t seem to have it in its rotation. There are many versions of it out there, including one by Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, whose music I like a lot, but it doesn’t have the iconic gravel of Louie Armstrong and just isn’t as good, so here we go.

12 Days of Seasonal Earworms You Need Right Now (Day 9)

On By angeliquejamailIn Christmas, Harry Connick Jr., holidays, music, nostalgia1 Comment

Okay, so tonight’s earworm isn’t technically a holiday song, but hear me out. Everyone needs a little break from Christmas music now and then, even the most devoted fans of it. The song I’m posting tonight — and in fact the entire album this song comes from — actually does mean Christmas to me, because my aunt gave me this album on cassette for Christmas when I was in eleventh grade, and it was one of my very favorite gifts that year. I listened to it nonstop that winter — as I am wont to do with music I love — and so this song, the title track, has been lodged in my brain for the last few decades as a Christmas song, even though it’s technically not one.

I’m not really into crooners, in general, I have to admit. I grew up listening to the original Big Bands and do like Big Band music. In my twenties, swing dancing was my favorite hobby. But the only song I can listen to with Michael Bublé in it is “The Elf’s Lament” by Barenaked Ladies, and I’m about done with Dean Martin and his whole rat pack. I’m just not interested.

But this song? Somehow I just love it.

12 Days of Seasonal Earworms You Need Right Now (Day 8)

On By angeliquejamailIn Christmas, holidays, music, Ryan Miller, Sarah Warburton1 Comment

I have to thank my friend Sarah Warburton for this one, because I hadn’t heard it before she shared it with me. And now I love it. Its catchy little self is running through both our heads.

In other news, I have one straggler essay left to grade before I can begin to tackle the trillion administrative tasks that have been put on hold until I could get my papers graded, and then once those are done, I’ll get a little time off, which I really need, wheee!

(Though, let’s be honest, I’m still going to be writing, because there aren’t any days off from being an author when you also have a day job that’s something else. And I cannot wait to get back to the writing! Edits of my next book, the second in the Animal Affinities series, are on the docket, so fans of Finis., rejoice! The next one is finally on the horizon. More details on that soon.)