Bookish Blatherings #7: Which Book(s) Made Me a Book Blogger

Welcome to Bookish Blatherings, my new feature in which I will be rambling about bookish or bloggish things and hopefully you will join in on the discussion.

I don't know about everyone else but I started book blogging because of a few certain books, especially one book in particular. But before I get into that, I wanted to provide a little background story regarding my journey in becoming a book blogger.

So, there I am, wrapping up my last semester at the University of Redlands. It was actually a short winter session, which means I was only taking one class. And that class was, drum roll please, Wine Appreciation. Oh yeah, don't me jelly! So for about a month I sat, drank, and learned about wine. For three hours a day, four days a week. Yeah, you could say I was a bit spoiled. It was freeing AWESOME. Now, I read a lot when I was young, but when high school and college came around I stopped. I was too adamant on getting all A's and doing extracurricular work to enjoy any fictional reading. But with my college career ending, and only me focusing on finding a job, I found myself having a little more time to play.

In walks my best friend who ruined/blessed my life with this series "I just had to read." She was gaga over. It's all she ever talked about. It was a paranormal YA trilogy that was all the craze at the time. I had never heard about it, which wasn't surprising since I fell out of the book world a long time ago. So, of course, I picked it up. O. M. G. Now, I have to assume some of you may have guessed which books I am talking about. And stop laughing at me. I didn't know any better. These were the first fictional books I had read in years and they were like gold at the time. A time when I had forgotten what good fiction was. So yes, me, Jennifer Bielman, was obsessed with Twilight!

Oh, in case you didn't know, I LOVE Charlie!

I freaking consumed the Twilight series in a matter of two weeks and I was hooked. I wanted MORE. But I wanted something a little more adult. I was 22 after all. So I searched "adult books similar to Twilight," and I hit the motherload. I was led to Laurell Hamilton's Anita Blake series, Kim Harrison's Hollows series, Jeaniene Frost's Night Huntress series, and Ilona Andrews' Kate Daniels series, just to name a few. And I found my passion for reading once again.

So college was over, and I could not find a job. I graduated the year in which the unemployment rate was at its highest. And I had very little experience to back up my degree in Business. So I started reading, a lot. Then I started writing, but that is a story for another day. All I did all day was read and look for a job. Then, one day, I just knew I had to share all these wonderful books I read with the world. So I researched book blogging and the rest is history.

Oddly enough, I never did review the Twilight saga. With the amount of books I have read over the years, and the knowledge I gained from writing, I now better recognize a good book from a bad book (when it comes to plot, writing, and so forth). I now know that Twilight is not what I thought it was. I did enjoy it. It's good fluff, but the writing and characterization, um yeah, not so great. But because of Twilight, my world opened up to all these amazing books that have changed my life.

I have a job now, actually a few jobs, and I am back in school for graphic and web design. And even though I am super busy, I never let school or work take away my reading addiction again. I am and will always be a total book nerd, book whore, book connoisseur, I don't know, whatever you want to call it. I am in it for the long haul this time. And I have Twilight to thank for that. Weird, right?

What book/books led you to the path of book blogging?

Or 

 How did you become a book blogger?

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