Welcome our first guest in the Feature Friday series on clean fiction at Astraea Press: Inga Kupp-Silberg. Find out more about her and why she always finds her way back to clean fiction.
Dear Astraea Press readers!
“Hello, my name is Inga and I’m a book blogger…” – this sentence is used by quite many organizations to start up meetings. Today I’m really glad to meet all of you.
I’ve been reading books since quite a young age and I’ve stopped counting how many books I’ve read during the years of growing up, because the number really does not matter. What matters are the wonderful experiences of what you can get through reading and this is what is important to me as a reader.
Couple of months ago I was encouraged to start up a book blog and on February 28th 2011 I decided to take my first steps in the book blogging world. Within 3 months of writing my blog, I’ve met so many wonderful people: bloggers, readers, authors, and publishers. It has been the smartest decision I’ve made! I have enjoyed it immensely and hopefully my readers have got something out of it, too.
My blog – Me and reading - is not very different from any other books bloggers and reviewers you might meet, but what I’m proud of is the international feedback that I’ve received from my blog readers. I made some statistics and I was happily shocked to see, that so far my audience is from 37 different countries and the number of daily hits is approximately 200 per day. I know that these numbers only have importance to me and it always depends on what or whom you are comparing yourself with. But thinking that I’m from one of the smallest countries in the world, for me to see that my blog has created interest from US to Australia and Philippines and from Northern Finland to South Africa that makes me proud and humble.
My blog consists of many different things. First, I write book reviews and these reviews are posted in my blog, in Goodreads.com, in amazon.com, sometimes in NetGalley.com and of course linked to other social medias like Twitter and Facebook. I really enjoy writing reviews and trying to do it in a form that could be useful for potential readers and maybe to authors. Secondly, I also write about different topics I meet in the book world and I enjoy doing that. Thirdly, I’m featuring Wednesday Wonderings, where I have different guests visiting my blog and writing about their thoughts. Last but not least I’m participating in all the fun stuff like interviewing authors, participating in different blog hops, virtual events, and weekly memes organizing giveaways – all these things which most of the bloggers do.
So, now you might think – Well, it’s really nice to know, but then what? Why are you here today?
I met a couple of authors from Astraea Press’ household and found an interesting question, which I was asked – why do I like clean fiction? That question challenged me, because I’m what you call an eclectic reader. As in, I enjoy reading books from very different genres and types. I read books for adults and Young Adults. I read books from paranormal to historical suspense. Therefore the question started haunting me, why do I always come back to read clean fiction?
There are several reasons why...
First reason is actually historical habit. By historical habit I mean that when I started reading novels, I was growing up in a society, where specific types of books and authors were forbidden and not published at all – everything which had to do with religion, sex, modern western life – it was simply not available and not allowed – you could not buy them and they were illegal. So the books I read, they were all clean fiction books. Most of the classical authors were available, just to mention few – Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontö, Lev Tolstoj, Fjodor Dostojevskij. I grew up with classical literary fiction where there were no explicit sex, no profanities; characters were quite clearly morally and ethically created and written. These books were simply beautiful to read, the language was clean and characters very likable. You found a very clear message in these books that what was right and what was wrong. Even when the plot took some characters into morally or ethically wrong paths, they were always brought back to redemption. Most of these books (not all of course) had very clear and happy endings. Even if the surrounding or the worlds created by authors were dark and problematic, there was always and still faith for something better and more beautiful. And I loved that and I still do.
So I grew up with clean fiction and therefore my reading habits always bring me back to clean fiction books.
Secondly, I find clean fiction books being educational. I know that many readers and authors might disagree on that, but I believe that you can actually learn from them. I have always compared clean fiction books with fairytales: they have a good story, strong point, tell people what is right or wrong. Besides that, the writing style is usually better than in other types of book. Nowadays you can write and read anything, anything what you think you can actually put in ink. Clean fiction books have beautiful and clean language and language can be used to describe different events and characters in a way that it is beautiful and interesting to read. When I’m saying that clean fiction is educational, then I’m talking about how to teach people to speak, talk, write in words, which is not offensive in any possible way and using these words and language to describe the life itself. When I studied languages, I used clean fiction books for improving my vocabulary. I speak 6 different languages and clean fiction books have seriously improved my language skills in these languages, including my own mother tongue. It is a gift to be able to talk and write using all these funny, interesting, fascinating words you find in one language.
Thirdly, in the world where everything can be questioned, doubted, proved scientifically, clean fiction books are like anchors. They are simple and sometimes that is exactly what you need in the changing world. By simple I do not think stupid or without content or meaning. Not at all. What I mean is, that these books help creating simplicity by describing what is good and what is bad and how do you find your way out from the bad to good.
To sum it up, even though I do read a lot of books, which fall outside of being clean fiction, I always turn back to them, because of the habit (I consider it as being a very good habit), strong and clear plots and characters and because the usage of language is educational.
Inga Kupp-Silberg
inga from www.ingasilbergbooks.com
Contacts for further discussions on the topic:
Email: inga.kupp@gmail.com
Goodreads.com: http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3012110-inga
Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/IngaSilberg
BookBlogs.ning.com: http://bookblogs.ning.com/profile/IngaKuppSilberg
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/profile.php?id=1427650801 and http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/IngaSilbergBooks/213143495380294
“Hello, my name is Inga and I’m a book blogger…” – this sentence is used by quite many organizations to start up meetings. Today I’m really glad to meet all of you.
I’ve been reading books since quite a young age and I’ve stopped counting how many books I’ve read during the years of growing up, because the number really does not matter. What matters are the wonderful experiences of what you can get through reading and this is what is important to me as a reader.
Couple of months ago I was encouraged to start up a book blog and on February 28th 2011 I decided to take my first steps in the book blogging world. Within 3 months of writing my blog, I’ve met so many wonderful people: bloggers, readers, authors, and publishers. It has been the smartest decision I’ve made! I have enjoyed it immensely and hopefully my readers have got something out of it, too.
My blog – Me and reading - is not very different from any other books bloggers and reviewers you might meet, but what I’m proud of is the international feedback that I’ve received from my blog readers. I made some statistics and I was happily shocked to see, that so far my audience is from 37 different countries and the number of daily hits is approximately 200 per day. I know that these numbers only have importance to me and it always depends on what or whom you are comparing yourself with. But thinking that I’m from one of the smallest countries in the world, for me to see that my blog has created interest from US to Australia and Philippines and from Northern Finland to South Africa that makes me proud and humble.
My blog consists of many different things. First, I write book reviews and these reviews are posted in my blog, in Goodreads.com, in amazon.com, sometimes in NetGalley.com and of course linked to other social medias like Twitter and Facebook. I really enjoy writing reviews and trying to do it in a form that could be useful for potential readers and maybe to authors. Secondly, I also write about different topics I meet in the book world and I enjoy doing that. Thirdly, I’m featuring Wednesday Wonderings, where I have different guests visiting my blog and writing about their thoughts. Last but not least I’m participating in all the fun stuff like interviewing authors, participating in different blog hops, virtual events, and weekly memes organizing giveaways – all these things which most of the bloggers do.
So, now you might think – Well, it’s really nice to know, but then what? Why are you here today?
I met a couple of authors from Astraea Press’ household and found an interesting question, which I was asked – why do I like clean fiction? That question challenged me, because I’m what you call an eclectic reader. As in, I enjoy reading books from very different genres and types. I read books for adults and Young Adults. I read books from paranormal to historical suspense. Therefore the question started haunting me, why do I always come back to read clean fiction?
There are several reasons why...
So I grew up with clean fiction and therefore my reading habits always bring me back to clean fiction books.
Secondly, I find clean fiction books being educational. I know that many readers and authors might disagree on that, but I believe that you can actually learn from them. I have always compared clean fiction books with fairytales: they have a good story, strong point, tell people what is right or wrong. Besides that, the writing style is usually better than in other types of book. Nowadays you can write and read anything, anything what you think you can actually put in ink. Clean fiction books have beautiful and clean language and language can be used to describe different events and characters in a way that it is beautiful and interesting to read. When I’m saying that clean fiction is educational, then I’m talking about how to teach people to speak, talk, write in words, which is not offensive in any possible way and using these words and language to describe the life itself. When I studied languages, I used clean fiction books for improving my vocabulary. I speak 6 different languages and clean fiction books have seriously improved my language skills in these languages, including my own mother tongue. It is a gift to be able to talk and write using all these funny, interesting, fascinating words you find in one language.
Thirdly, in the world where everything can be questioned, doubted, proved scientifically, clean fiction books are like anchors. They are simple and sometimes that is exactly what you need in the changing world. By simple I do not think stupid or without content or meaning. Not at all. What I mean is, that these books help creating simplicity by describing what is good and what is bad and how do you find your way out from the bad to good.
To sum it up, even though I do read a lot of books, which fall outside of being clean fiction, I always turn back to them, because of the habit (I consider it as being a very good habit), strong and clear plots and characters and because the usage of language is educational.
Inga Kupp-Silberg
inga from www.ingasilbergbooks.com
Contacts for further discussions on the topic:
Email: inga.kupp@gmail.com
Goodreads.com: http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3012110-inga
Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/IngaSilberg
BookBlogs.ning.com: http://bookblogs.ning.com/profile/IngaKuppSilberg
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/profile.php?id=1427650801 and http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/IngaSilbergBooks/213143495380294
Inga, you've just made my day! You managed to put into words exactly the concepts I strive for when I write. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteThanks for hanging out Inga.
ReplyDelete