My First 500 Posts!

With my last post about the National Historic Site of Batoche and its connection to The Third Riel Conspiracy by Stephen Legault being my 500^th post I have been reflecting on the 500 posts and being a blogger.

I had wanted to create a place on the worldwide web where readers of mysteries could have information on mysteries set in the province of Saskatchewan and the authors of those mysteries.

I am glad to have posted reviews of 28 mysteries set in Saskatchewan and will shortly be filling in a gap with a review of A Political Addiction as part of my post for “W” in the Crime Fiction Alphabet meme.

Saskatchewan authors, Anthony Bidulka and Gail Bowen, have generously responded to questions which have made for interesting Q and A posts.

I created a page for the Rest of Canada which, together with my participation in the Canadian Book Challenge for the last 2 years, has broadened my reading of Canadian mysteries. I have now committed myself to reading at least 13 books by Canadian authors each year.

I doubt I would have had the pleasure of reading L.R. Wright had I not started blogging and been looking for Canadian mysteries.

As a lawyer whose practice includes a substantial amount of criminal and civil litigation I enjoy reading legal mysteries. I have not come across another blogger who puts together a list of legal mysteries. I think there are more good legal mysteries being published now than ever.

The introduction of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction has added to my focus on legal mysteries. I will shortly be reading Havana Requiem by Paul Goldstein which was the 2013 Prize Winner.

I set up a page in which I discuss mystery bookstores I have visited. I have been alittle disappointed that the page is not often visited. I fear the lack of page views is an illustration of the decline in bookstores.

While my focus is on mysteries I continue to read non-fiction and put up reviews of those books. I find I need some non-fiction amidst the crime fiction to maintain my reading interest in mysteries.

I have chosen but one book reading challenge, the Canadian Book Challenge, each year as I feel I would be too restricted in my reading if I was taking part in multiple challenges.

I have enjoyed the memes hosted by Kerrie Smith at her blog, Mysteries in Paradise. She is an amazing blogger. Taking part in the Crime Fiction Alphabet memes has been great fun. For last year and this year I adopted themes. Last year each letter was a post of an author I had read. This year I am putting up a post about a book or an author or a crime topic with which I have a personal connection. I admit the letter “X” which is looming is proving a challenge. I do not seem to have many connections with “X”.

The most unexpected joy has been meeting virtually fellow bloggers from around the world. I never expected to make new friends through blogging. I am always impressed by the depth of knowledge and kindness of the bloggers and readers I have met through the web.

An unexpected bonus has been making comments on other blogs and getting comments on my blog. The indefatigable Margot Kinberg of Confessions of a Mystery Novelist has been a welcome and constant commenter. I am amazed how many places she travels to in the world of blogging while maintaining her superb daily posts.

I have found I neither have the energy nor inclination to put up daily posts. I admire those bloggers who have that dedication. If I can average 3 posts a week I am content.

The post which has garnered the most page views is “N” is for Stuart Neville. The image of “N” I borrowed from Kerrie’s blog somehow ended up on Google images for “N”. Blogger tells me there have been 17,354 page views of the post and counting. One of the ironies of the world of blogging is that my most popular post has nothing to do with the content of the post.

I started blogging as I wanted to talk about books. The first 500 posts have been fun. I look forward to more blogging adventures.