Hello and happy Saturday. I think I’ve told this story before in here, but this isn’t my first blog. It isn’t even my second one. I’ve been blogging since I was about 21, when I discovered Rainbow Rowell and Jenny Han and David Levithan and fell in love with the bookish world. I’ve always been a reader, but writing about what I read and connecting with others was wonderful. Through this journey, I’ve come across a variety of platforms, stores and services that are related to books, and that’s how I got acquainted with Netgalley.

For those of you who don’t know, Netgalley is a website that lets you read books in exchange for an honest review. You must post the review directly to Netgalley, but you can also share it via Amazon, social media or your blog. The whole deal was amazing to me: I’d be reading new releases, often before they were even out to the public, I would have content to post on my blog, and more importantly, I wouldn’t have to pay any money for the books I was reading. What ended up happening was I got giddy. There were so many titles and covers that were attractive to me that I requested hundreds, some even were sent to me directly by the publishers or other media agencies, and I couldn’t keep up.

Having a large TBR list full of backlist titles is a common problem among readers, and it’s okay as long as there’s no pressure or deadline to review any books, but with Netgalley, I did. I felt sort of guilty DNFing books because I knew my reviews wouldn’t be accurate, but then I couldn’t just say that I hadn’t finished reading a book (even though that was an option in the website) for fear that my profile rating would become lower and then I’d get less titles approved. It got to a point where reading ARCs wasn’t fun for me. It was a chore, and so I made the radical choice I’ve made time and again: I decided to delete my account and delete the titles I’d acquired via Netgalley and to focus on the books that I’d purchased because I was interested in them, not because I felt pressured to review them.

Since the day that I wrote the idea for this post in my planner, I hadn’t really given much thought to Netgalley. I enjoyed using the service for years, and I appreciate the fact that bloggers and people in the bookish community in general can have access to newer titles and a platform to share their thoughts, but I don’t think I will be creating another account anytime soon.