Alli the Book Giraffe

Hello readers! It’s time for a tag post. This is one I did 4 years ago now and I thought it’d be time to update it. It’s essentially an intro to yourself, your blog, and your reading.

Don’t forget to check out my 2021 version to see my previous answers! I really enjoyed seeing how much my answers have changed.

This tag was created by Lala’s Book Reviews, so please make sure to check her post out if you have not.

Introduce yourself!

My name is Allison, I’m 31-years-old, and from Indiana. I am a single parent to my step-daughter, who turns 12 next month. I have a dog named Padme, three cats, Gamora, Sirius, and a hermit crab. You can see pics of my cats and dog on my ABOUT page.

I’m about to finish my first year in college for accounting. But, I have been to college before and ended up dropping out during COVID. I recently changed my major from accounting to forensic accounting.

I am a big introvert and am autistic, so I don’t leave the house often. But I do enjoy going on walks occasionally.

My biggest hobby outside of reading is Kpop. My favorite is Enhypen and &Team. Is anyone else excited for BTS to be back together this month? I’m mostly excited for Yoongi (Suga) to be out.

What is your favorite thing to drink?

I have recently become a coffee lover, which is very out of character for me. I mostly drink tea or Dr. Pepper Zero these days, but I have a coffee every day.

What is your favorite season?

I honestly prefer spring and autumn the most because it isn’t too hot or cold most days in those seasons. I am SHOCKED that I said summer last time I did this tag.

I hate being in the heat and I get sunburns extemely easy. Even when I was a kid and spent most my time outside, I would get sunburnt so badly.

Do you have any special talents?

A weird talent that I have is being able to untangle any necklace. I swear, if you have a necklace that you can’t get untangled, I can do it.

My daughter got two necklaces at her birthday party and somehow tangled them together within the first 24 hours of having them. It took me 45 minutes, but I got them apart.

When and why did you start your blog?

I started my blog in August of 2020 on Wix and then moved to WordPress in February 2021.

I decided to start blogging because I love books and wanted a place to talk about it online. I have been on all platforms for book content and this will always be my favorite one.

What is something you wish you knew about blogging when you started?

I wish I knew more about everything that goes into being a blogger. It isn’t just about writing your opinion out and hitting publish. Getting eyes on your content is actually really difficult.

I spent a lot of time in 2024 researching social media sites to post on and recently have been trying to increase my SEO and removing dead links on my blog. It really is hard to find anything online about these things.

What has been the hardest part of blogging?

I am going to say what I said last time, thumbnails. This is also something I’ve been tweaking lately. I want all of them to semi-match and it is harder than it looks. I’m not the best at designing or anything like that, but I think I’ve got it down pretty well so far.

By adding stars to every one of my main thumbnails, I think this has been achieved. I am talking about Top Ten Tuesday, Tell Me Something Tuesday, WWW Wednesday, Down the TBR Hole, Book Blogger Hop, The Sunday Post, my TAG thumbnails, and one other one for random posts that aren’t in a series.

I also switched the cursive to my logo and the title of the post to non-cursive. I learned recently that many people don’t like cursive, people who are dyslexic struggle with cursive more than other fconts, and I know that they aren’t teaching it in schools like they used to, so many people can’t read it at all.

My Top Ten Tuesday post was good, but I added the stars to make it match the others.

My Tell Me Something Tuesday thumbnail was sort of unreadable, but I did like it.

The font is visible now, but I still think I need to tweak it a little bit.

This one has changed A LOT over the years.

But I think the new one is the best overall.

I didn’t even have my blog name on the second one, and the new one has it. I did like the paint behind the words Down the TBR Hole, but that was paid content from when I paid for Canva in the past, and I no longer do.

I am going to be tweaking all my monthly TBR thumbnails going forward, too. Not to match each other, but just to look better overall. Some of them are good and others aren’t.

Let me know if you guys are interested in this topic more and I can show how much they’ve changed over time! I can make a post going over the changes. It has been a long journey.

What has been the most rewarding part of blogging?

Finding reader friends! I also just enjoy seeing other people’s opinions on things. I don’t really care if I’m following people who have the same exact reading tastes as me. But I do love seeing what people have to say, especially in posts like Let’s Talk Bookish or Book Blogger Hop.

Do you write your posts ahead of time or the day of?

This really depends. Currently I am writing this post almost a week in advance. I also have quite a few coming out this next month that I have written in advance, but other times I am writing posts the night before.

I typically write WWW Wednesday and The Sunday Post the night before. I have been in a writing mood lately, so I have been writing a lot of posts a week or more in advance, but that is not always the case for me.

Who are your top five favorite authors?

I wrote a Book Blogger Hop about this before. I have so many these days, but I’ll always say my absolute favorite is Stephen King. I don’t read his books enough anymore.

Other than Stephen King, I would say Rebecca F. Kenney, Brandon Sanderson, Alex Gino, and Sophie Kinsella.

What genre do you read the most?

This chart is a collective of every book I’ve read from 2012 to 2025. I am honestly surprised my most read genres is mystery/thriller!

What genre surprised you how much you love it?

I would say scifi. I had really been against reading it for a long time because I thought I wouldn’t like it, and it really has become one of my favorites.

Which popular book didn’t live up to the hype for you?

I can honestly say so many. Anything in the romance genre that is really popular is usually something I dislike. I don’t know what it is. I don’t really care for Emily Henry, Ali Hazelwood, or even Abby Jimenez. I don’t see what everyone else is seeing.

Who are some popular authors you haven’t tried?

Two extremely popular authors I haven’t tried (and probably never will) are Colleen Hoover and James Patterson. I just don’t think I’ll like Colleen Hoover.

James Patterson worries me because he publishes so many books. I fear it’s a quantity over quality type of thing. PLUS, I’ve never heard anyone gushing about how good his books are.

If there ever is a book he puts out that I hear someone talk about being amazing, maybe I’d try it, but I don’t know.

What upcoming releases are you excited for?

Check out my Summer Releases I Can’t Wait to Read to see 6 books I’m anticipating this summer.

Do you listen to music while reading?

No. As a kpop lover, it is nearly impossible to listen to music while I read. If I listen to anything, it’ll be ASMR. I love listening to ASMR when I read, when I do school, and also when I’m trying to sleep. It’s so calming.

Where else can we find you?

All my links are under the subscribe button to the left, or at the bottom of all my posts in my Linktree.

I am most active on Twitter, but mostly for kpop.

I also have Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Tiktok, YouTube, and Goodreads. I do have a Story Graph and Fable, too, but I don’t really use them often.

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If you enjoyed this post, check out my Book Tag Masterlist for more book tags I’ve done!

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Happy blogging and bookish adventures! 📚🦒✨

This post was created by Allison Wolfe for www.allithebookgiraffe.com and is not permitted to be posted anywhere else.

Where to find me: https://linktr.ee/Allithebookgiraffe

Add this user on Goodreads for all your trigger warning needs: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/86920464-trigger-warning-database