Thinking Through Thursday (5)

Welcome to another "Thinking Through Thursday"! This is a post I write (or try to) every Thursday in which I discuss various bookish goodness. 

This week's discussion is

ARCS/REVIEW BOOKS:

THE GOOD AND THE BAD

The Good:

They're free! Well, at least for us readers. And come one. Who doesn't want a free book? You'd be crazy to turn that down! So you get a free book and all you have to do is write a review? Sign me up! I absolutely love getting books from authors and publishers, not only because they are free, but that means that they like what I do. It makes me feel special XD And one great thing about ARCS is the fact that you get to read books before others! Yeah, I'm totally bragging here. I hate waiting. Actually, I'm pretty patient normally, but when it comes to books that don't come out for months and months and months, it gets tedious. So it's a lot of fun to be able to get books before they come out and get the word spread around. (P.S. Thanks to all those who sent me ARCs/Review copies!) 

The Bad: 

Time limits suck. Especially for those like me that are not organized. At all. I like to try and read ARCs and review them before they come out, but my Netgalley list is through the roof! There is no way I can read and review them all before their release dates, no matter how hard I try. I'm human. Sue me. The same with review books. I looooove getting review books because I know that these authors are giving me a book and hoping that I'll spread the word around and it's nice to know they trust me. But it's hard. I read because I like to read. I started blogging because I wanted to spread my love of books. ARCs and review books were kind of an added bonus. But to be honest, sometimes getting ARCs and Review books make my job more tedious than fun and it can make me feel rushed. Don't get me wrong, I love having this opportunity, I've just got to learn to limit my amount. There are soo many books out there that I want to read, but I usually give ARCs and reviews priority, but sometimes thats hard, especially if I'm only reading it to read it before its release date, not because I'm actually in the mood to read it.

I picked this topic today because I'll be revising by Review Policy. I will no longer take review requests (at this time) except perhaps for blog tours. All ARCs I receive will be due to my request from the publisher, Netgalley, ect. I'm doing this only because I feel like this gets to be more of a job than a hobby. I want to review books, but I also want to have fun while doing it. And I have so many older books that are on my TBR that I need to get around to reading also. Most ARCs will be through Netgalley.

So what about my fellow bloggers out there? Any advice you can give me? Any organizational tools would be greatly appreciated XD 

All the best ♥