Monthly Update : Feb

Admin's Log
Stardate 01/03/13
Somewhere in South India. Sleepless.

So another month has passed. After a frenzied January, where we had 36 posts, February was comparatively relaxed. A bit more than relaxed actually. 3 posts!!!

*can I bury last month's archive somewhere where nobody ever finds it?*

Anyway, there are no complaints whatsoever. No complaints, no sad faces, no scoldings. Trust me. We all need a mass bunk now and then. Although not be design, February was the month when all of you were busy. Together. Including me.

Well Feb is over. Its March. So ditch your sarongs and bikinis and the pina coladas you've been sipping all month and get back to work. That also includes the guys, pitifully less we might be, ditch that cowboy hat, the Sunny Leone HD movie and buckle up.

We've books to read. Loads of them. Yes, March will have less activity as well. Most of you will have exams. See, I'm forever patient. Something my girlfriend refuses to believe. Nevertheless for you guys having exams, pick up your course books, study hard and score well.

Now. Serious things.

We've book requests. You know, because we've been sending you lists now and then. Finish those. Don't keep the authors waiting. That's not what we do.

We've new people here as well. You guys are welcome to ALOP, whenever you make an appearance. Hopefully that will be soon. Talking of making an appearance, some of you have been away for quite some time. That includes some core members of the team. You know who you are, I'm not naming anyone. As I said, immense patience I've. Also, it has come to my attention that one of our dear admins wanted to quit because he/she thinks they haven't been able to give appropriate time to us. *tch tch*

I will be reminding you and everyone one thing that is the foundation of this place. YOU DON'T LEAVE YOUR FAMILY. Sometimes I really want to spank you like little kids. Yes, you're making me and Nimue think of you as children. Aren't we cool enough?? Do we force you into anything? Do we ask much from you?

Anyway, March is here. A new month, a new beginning. There will be a giveaway by next week. This time it might be sponsored. We're in talks. Nevertheless, another exciting reason to come back to us. 

Also, most of you have expressed your displeasure at the new commenting system, DISQUS. I admit, its a new thing we implemented. But we do believe in going forward. So we humbly ask you to create an account or log in with your FB/GMAIL/TWITTER id. Its really simple.

Also, I'd like to see some more active participation in the ongoing challenges.

Have a good month folks. Read more, have fun, party hard, get drunk, GET LAID, make someone smile, call me up and then read some more.

Love,
FL and the entire Admin team.

STICKY POST| URGENT

Hello everyone,

The site is under maintenance as of now. If you find any difficulty opening www.alotofpages.com, we request you to type http://www.alotofpages.blogspot.com

When we started ALOP, we had a vision. After 15 months of doing what we do best, we've decided to take this to a whole new level with a whole lot of new possibilities.

The admins at ALOP are doing their best to minimise any inconvenience you might face.

Hopefully, by December 10th, we will be back with a fresh look, a fresh concept and a fresh perspective.

Keep reading, keep reviewing, keep having fun.

Giveaway Winners

Uh hello folks,

I just realized that none of you knew that the Giveaway winners were announced 36 hours ago. And I apologize for not writing a post. The winners are announced on the widget included in the giveaway post. 

Nevertheless, our 2 winners are :

Nimue and Pulkit

Congrats!!!!! You know the drill. Choose one book, send us the mail.

Also, a very, very special prize to a certain 10-year old gorgeous, who managed to blow every other competitor away. Congrats Anindita! 

NOTE!

Some of you do NOT even take the rules properly. 

eg. When the widget says, SHARE the link and paste the shared link in the given space, please do THAT. Else we are unable to double check your entry. I had to disallow a couple of you.

Frivolous Fridays - A Weekly Meme

SEX

Yes, now that I've your attention, how about a meme every week??

We all have been reading and reviewing stuff for a long time now [and hopefully we will still continue doing that]

So, how about we talk about something that you like? No, not sex. Something in those pages you bury your nose in, something in between those lines that you keep reading, something that you'll probably remember years later even if you forgot the climax of the book.

Lets share those, shall we. 

We can talk about anything in this meme. An author, a character, a group, a symbol, a blahblahblah. This way, we can share what we liked in a book specifically and others who read it, may like it as well. And this will, hopefully, garner that much needed interest to jump to the book or books you've read.

For eg. Someone can talk about Dan Brown or The Famous Five or The Death Eaters. You get my drift, right? Or you can talk about a scene or an event, like Quidditch or absolutely anything that you've loved, that you remember.

What I'd like more than that is :

1. Where it was first published/appeared/heard of

2. What you liked/loved/drooled about it

And that's it. Tomorrow, I'd start with the first one. And every Friday from here on, we will ask 2-3 members to post for the meme. There will be NO REVIEWS on Fridays. And when every member has written a post and the cycle is completed, it will start all over again. 

There has to be a lot of things you loved or read. So lets share.

What do you think? Need opinions.

Monthly Review: July-August

Hellllo Hello Everybody!

July has gone and left us with new responsibilities and experiences to cherish. August is here and I am waiting for certain someone to come down and save my arse again! I tell you running this whole thing ain’t easy! I bow before you FL! Ahem. I am also talking about the New Admins and Deputy Owners/God Mothers and Wing Women! Without you ladies, I have no idea how I would have managed! Yep! With FL taking an infinite break, we have mostly women handling the high chairs! :D No worries boys! You all are still beloved reviewers! I just mean to mention how women can work effectively ;) Ah never mind!

Image Source: desicomments.com

Soooo, coming to the point – we saw average number of reviews this month as well as last month – which were very good. I would specially like to mention Vivek’s reviews – they are brilliant! Guys, do leave him comments of appreciation! We had reviews from Nightflier, Nimue, Maithili, Swarnali, UCV, FL (I’m reading your reviews! Pinky Swear! ) Pulkit's being missed here as well! (Yes, I know I had blundered here) We have new admin – Swarnali, who is still learning her way around. Nikhi – I hope you find the book a good read. Arpita – your reviews are awaited! If I have left out anybody, believe me, it's human error. Correct me where ever needed! :D 

Now coming to the list of things we need to know and take up to make our place glittery and gaga!

Mixed Variety Challenge will be back by September 1st, for sure. So those who have been not reviewing, come on guys! Girdle up and exercise your grey cells (This applies to me as well. Sigh.) There is a lot of written matter out there – pick and choose! J

Monthly Giveaways will be back as well, by September 1^st! (Yes!!) Now people, the reason that had you hooked to reading to some extent (Greed, Passion, Luck?) is going to be back – so get back on track and start reading!

Behold your breath people, ‘cause coming September, the Giveaways may reach across the globe. Yes. We might go International! See, now you have another reason! Read read read! :D

Also, we have been thinking about starting a new section called Contributors’ Interviews – which means you get to choose from the list of Admins and Panelists and their interviews shall be taken. Please give your suggestions as to whether you would like something like this! We all will get to know each other better this way – ‘cause Come on! A lot can happen at A Lot of Pages! :D

We have another wonderful suggestion from Nimue (By the way, she has suffered slip disc and let’s hope she recovers quick quick! Take care Girl!). We want to start a page which is dedicated to Books and Best Friends. Now, we all must have read something somewhere, which might have reminded us of our one friend – whether good or bad. So this page will be more about sharing your experiences while reading a book, how you felt and remembered that one person in your life. Afterall, books are also written through memories.

So, give your views about Contributors’ Interviews and Books and Best Friends!

Finally, we may also have our own Weekly Meme! But FL will talk about it later.

There have been cancellations of memberships for people who have not met the criterion of reviewing two books a month and have not furnished appropriate reasons, even after constant reminders and emails. We don’t want to force you and make reading a task for you – hence, we welcome reasons! Therefore, do write to us, we will listen to you.

Annnnnd, with this we come to an end of our Monthly Review. Ohh, it’s just end of our review, but we have a lot to catch up with! Don’t we? :D

Let’s Rule the World!

Love,

MSM

Montly Review : April '12

Hello.

April is over. Less than 2 months for ALOP's birthday :D

First of all introductions. Vivek is here. For the ones who do not know him, he is a reading machine. Yes, if there is one person I envy, its him! why?? I was smug with my 750+ odd books in my personal library until I came to know that Vivek owns for than 7800 books. yes, you heard it right. Burst my pretty bubble indeed :D

Anyway, this guy is awesome. Read his reviews guys. He reads a wide variety of books. Some authors that you probably have not even heard off. So read him, increase your knowledge, it will be helpful. RKP is probably happy that we have someone who reads his tastes. Well, am glad. This will keep him off my back atleast and maybe his attacks on me would be minimum. Anyway, I'm probably going to ask Vivek to excuse himself from the MoM to give you guys a fair chance.

Okay MoM thingy now.

Vivek is the winner as you all know. Hence, he wins a book from the admins. Although I'm at my wits end about what to send him.

Aishwarya, girl am sorry for the delay of your book. You still have a pending book. Arpita and Nimue, your vouchers are pending, I realize. Gimme a couple of weeks to sort that out.

Ahem. Regarding attendance, MSM finally comes back. Yeah, and that too on her birthday month. That's good. Where are the rest of you??? Oh and with 16 reviews in a month, Vivek broke the record held my Freelancer for a long time.

Okay what else? Yeah...where are my admins?? Why am I replying to author requests 3-4 days late? Chalo, koi na. Be back soon. We are going to have another new member in our group. A guy. Finally, this blog is starting to have male members :P

Pssst. Giveaways, come back on 4th May. Keep visiting.

Monthly Review

Hello all...

What a month this has been...Oh my friggin' GOD!! {Sorry Lord, if you were here, you you'd have swore too}

Out of the 59 posts for the month which has the least number of days, we had 56 reviews {the rest 3 were admin notices}

The MoM thingy was a bad bad thing :P

Its once again ARPITA with a boggling 13 reviews, followed by Swarnali (12) and FL (10). I was so busy trying to put Arpita out of the equation that I never realized Swarnali was swooping in almost snatching the prize away.

And as you all know, the one who wins the MoM for 3 consecutive months gets 3 books of their choice every month for the next 3 months. *gulp*

Congrats Arpita.

Thank you everyone this month. A very, very heartful thank you for everyone since most of you have reviewed more than your quota. You've no idea how proud I'm to have you here.

Thank you Nightflier, Nimue, Aishwarya, Pulkit, PeeVee and everyone else.

That being said, I'm excusing myself from the next 2 MoM's again until someone wins 2 in a row. 'Coz there is no way in hell am going to make things a breeze for you. This increases the excitement and the challenge.

Now that the MoM fever is over, I strongly request you to go back and read all the reviews and drop a comment to appreciate the work the contributors have done. Because, any review we do, is for you.

Also, NIMUE and ARPITA (yet again) are now proud members of the Purple card holder. You won't be receiving the purple cards as you both are admins [blue is mandatory for admins], but you WILL definitely receive the privileges. You guys join me in that league, even though I don't have the privileges for myself :P

Since you both crossed the required review count and the time spent in this place, you'll be receiving 2 flipkart vouchers of INR 1200/- every 3 months for any purchase at Flipkart.com or purchases worth INR 1200 from The Book Depository. Your first voucher will reach your mailbox anytime between March 1 to May 31.

Remember, you will have to proceed to the next class within 10 months of being a Fresher. If you fail to do so, you will still be a Fresher but will stop receiving the gift coupon after the 6th month.

Now your monthly quota of 2 reviews gets scrapped. Instead you have to review a minimum of 80 reviews in 10 months. Your total reviews since your date of joining should be 120+ and you must have spent 18 months at ALOP to reach the next stage.

Also note, anyone who hasn't received their starter membership cards yet, please drop a mail at alotofpages@gmail.com. I WANT EVERYONE TO DISPLAY THEIR BADGES ON THEIR BLOGS OR ANYWHERE THEY CAN!

Also, the starting of a new month heralds the coming of a giveaway. This month on the occasion of Women's Day celebrated worldwide on March 8, the books we feature on our giveaway will be by women authors. And there is a big possibility of the giveaway being sponsored by Homeshop18. Currently we are in talks with the management of that website and we hope to have some good news soon.

Last but not the least, Nimue has been pestering me about the challenge widget not working properly. Don't worry, we've escalated the matter to our technical team and they are working hard to have the error fixed.

{who am I kidding? :P I've do it on my own, after I figure it out}

Yes, Swarnali, you can have your deserved break. Read your syllabus and rock your exams. Visit us once a while and drop us some kick-ass comments.

That being said, I'm definitely updating the Membership Privileges. Its getting way too easy!

Also, Author Interviews are totally on. We are interviewing an author as we speak {a pretty author, I must say}. By the end of the week, we will post it. Drop us your feedback.

P.S| Invite your friends. We have the passion, we have the reviews...what we lack is readers.

P.P.S| *runs to check his bank balance*

NOTICE TO YOURS TRULY

Books.

We all love them. [at least the ones who visit and write in this blog]

And everyone of us has an opinion about a book.

LET THIS BE THE ONE AND ONLY WARNING TO AUTHORS AND SO-CALLED-FRIENDS-OF-AUTHORS

We review what we read. If you don't like it, fine with us. WE ARE NOT PAID TO PROMOTE YOUR BOOK.

A certain so-called-cousin of an author recently commented that she didn't like one of the reviews. Well, you can kiss my pretty flat ass!

Without naming any names, let me remind you that what we do, we do on our own. If we like it, we will praise the book. If we don't, we will give a scathing review. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Its not that the Presidents of the various countries listen to every word we write and stop a book from publication.

Again, without naming anyone, let me remind you that you can stop reading us anytime you want.

For all the wonderful writers, you guys are awesome. You can take a negative review and not mind at all. Its your close friends and acquaintances who lack the brains! (occasionally)

I want to thank all of you authors for giving us the chance, time and again, to read and review your book. I want to thank all the contributors of the blog for writing an honest review everytime. You make me proud.

We will continue to keep doing just that. Honest reviews is what you expect from us and we'll never disappoint you.

Keep reading us. Keep an open mind. In the end, its you who decides to read a book, not us or our words.

Keep reading, keep sending recommendations, keep up the good work.

To all authors, you guys are awesome.

That's it. Over and Out.

P.S| No one bosses my people around!

Monthly Review

January 2012 has come and gone. And it was a good beginning.

We have had new people join us. Hello Swarnali... Oh there are 3 more, but I don't see them anywhere. I think I should remind them once more before I take action.

Smita has been kind enough with her review requests and we have successfully reviewed atleast a couple of those.

The only thing disappointing is the fact that again some of you didn't finish your monthly 2 reviews.

So, I've decided that we will e-mail you once by 15th of every month if you fail to review atleast once. And again, a gentle reminder on 20th of every month for the second review. I hope you will atleast respond when we give you reminders.

Attendance is abysmal too. If you are not reviewing, atleast read other reviews and leave a comment. We all need a comment now and then to appreciate our work.

Nimue and FL took a much needed break and it looked like the blog was stuck in static mode. Guys, the blog doesn't run on its own as much as you want it. There are pages to update, requests to assign,  giveaways to prepare and execute, reply to queries, plans to make it more easier.

MSM will be out for the better half of this month due to personal reasons. Nimue and I are back for admin duty. Pulkit has his own personal work and is granted leave from time to time. Maithili has her own group blog and she knows how tough it is to handle everything. (I'm glad that she manages to do her job here). And still it is not enough for us.

I'm assigning duties to admins from now on. Also, I am assigning admin rights to Arpita. She has deserved it. I hope you all will agree. I am proud of her progress.

The rest of you guys, as usual, have been awesome with your reviews. We are starting a group chat every Saturday 8pm - 11pm. Feel free to join us.

UCV has been inactive this month. But we hope to see her active soon.

Now, time for the MEMBER OF THE MONTH thingy.

FL and Arpita are tied with 4 reviews each. As FL mentioned he won't be contesting, the surprise gift goes once again, to ARPITA. [Note: FL's reviews will be included for Member of the Month from this month. No more making things easier for you :D]

By mid February or early March, we are starting the Author Interview section. *sigh* more research on that later. I will be sending the admins on how to proceed and will need their inputs.

Giveaway starts in 2 days. Gear up for some great books.

Let February be as awesome as always.

Regards,
the Admins

Of Winners, Updates and More

A year has gone, but A Lot of Pages has just started.

2012 will bring many many wonderful surprises and hopefully many more people start to flock here.

Oh yes! Announcement time!

The Giveaway has finally ended! And as you know, this time there are 3 winners!!!

So, congratulations

1. Hemish Purushottam
2. Swarnali Das
3. Maithili Bhatnagar
 
Winners send a mail to alotofpages@gmail.com with the book of your choice, your postal address and contact number. ASAP
 
Start your new year with books! Oh How i wish I could crawl inside one such story and be a dashing dragon rider. Or even a thief. A dashing thief mind you!

[I had 2 other names...but after cross checking I found that they clicked on 'done' without actually filling the entry. I just hope they didn't think it was a shortcut and I wouldn't double-check!]

MEMBER OF THE MONTH

When the month started, I thought this was going to be close one between UCV and NIMUE. And then came Arpita, guns blazing, delivery one awesome review after another!!

10 reviews!! 10 reviews by her! Kudos girl. You make me proud!
[pssst...FREELANCER still leads with 14 reviews in a month :D]

So Arpita wins a novel from us. And no, this time I'm not gonna tell the name. I don't want her to twist my ear and change the prize like Nimue did :P :P

READING CHALLENGE

The Mixed Variety Reading Challenge 2011 is officially over! That was fun until Arpita (yet again) whizzed past me and Nimue to be the only one to finish the challenge.

Shame on you guys!! Atleast you could have tried!

Anyway, moving on, a new Reading Challenge is up from January 1 to April 30, 2012. Check out the CHALLENGES page and start reading!

OTHER UPDATES :

With the new year, I promised we will grow bigger. Oh well, my promises are tall claims most of the time. But nevertheless, 1 page ais up under Contact Us section.... the much awaited "Share-a-Book" initiation by NIMUE is finally underway. You know where to check!

Author Interviews will be up soon within a month and Nichola Marsh, author of "Busted in Bollywood", promised me an interview :D

NOTES:

Giveaway winners, do VISIT this place even when there are no giveaways :D

Friends, bring more people in. This is a fun place, is it not???

MAY WE RISE ABOVE ALL
(somebody say AMEN)

News Flash

A new page is up under Browse By section. "Its called Books Reviewed So Far"..
With so many of you finding it hard to check on a book whether if its reviewed or not and not knowing which genre to search for, hopefully, this page will make things much easier.

Though I admit, it was one pain in the ass to gather every page into one.

Also, I won't be getting rid of the genre pages. I love them too much..but i did delete a few pages so that it doesn't confuse you lot. I removed the western/drama/humour/adventure/espionage/classic pages. Adventure and Espionage novels will now go into the Thriller section. The rest goes to "everything else" page.

I want you all to link your review in the "Books Reviewed So Far" page as soon as you post a review. The admins really can't do everything. Please please please look how I made that page. I don't want you to link it in such a way that i have to come and correct it again.

For eg, if the book is "The Notebook", it will be placed as "Notebook, The" under the alphabet N.

And again when you place it under a particular alphabet, just don't add it in the bottom. Its alphabetical wise.

Nimue, you are in charge of updating the Author pages, while I will handle the Genre pages.

Again one more request, Please tag your reviews with your name, genre and series if available.

For eg. if the series is "House of Night", tag it as Series - House of Night. If the novel has a character that you know is common in other novels from the same author, make it a series too. Eg. There is no series for Kathy Reichs novels. But Temperance Brennan is the recurring character. So tag any Reichs' novels as Series - Temperance Brennan.

A small step yet a big leap

And as you all were reading the reviews and commenting, ALOP took a silent step into the next phase.

http://alotofpages.blogspot.com

Yes, ALOP is now a website. A small beginning for future things to come. Yet an important milestone for some of us who had dreamed of this for a long time. We owe our thanks to Pulkit for this.

The transition to .com will be complete in 3 days and I promise you, by the end of 1 year anniversary of ALOP, ALOP will be a lot more sleek and a lot more fun. That means a total webpage design change and SEO that might burn a big hole in my pocket. BUT, without compromising on the simplicity and authentic feel of the current format.

Eventually, we might have to place a few ads. But fear not, it will not be be ads for Viagra or any ads that might pop up in between. If there might be ads, it would be the extreme minimum and where people hardly see it. [I know, you guys might be asking what's the point in having ads, if you don't see it. *sigh* leave that to me and the admins to figure it out*]

There might also be a couple of widgets which will adorn the right hand column, but we will make sure its not overloaded. 

Also, this is the time when I need my admins the most. With Maithili and MSM out for the rest of the month, I will have to bank on Pulkit and Nimue to update the pages. We are sorely lacking behind on that front.

P.S| Nightflier gave us a suggestion of creating an internal database where we can jot down the names of future reviews. Just in case, no two members start reading the same book and decide to review it. Looks like a good idea, I'll add a widget in a couple of days where we can atleast jot down the names of the reviews we might do in the coming month.

Nimue floated an idea of sharing and exchanging novels within the community. Though its too early to go national on this front, I think, a city at a time might be a viable option. I'll confer with the admins about this and keep you guys updated.

Too much work. *Sigh* Pray for me :P

ALOP Membership Privileges

Why choose ALOP??

What's so special here??

Oh wait! The giveaways are not enough for you :P
Just kidding, click HERE to read why!!

To go there Manually, hover on 'Contact us' in the upper menu bar and click on 'Membership Privileges' 

An Added Bonus to Contributors

Now that we have 15 members contributing to this blog [both active and hibernating], I would like to thank you all from my whole big, big thumping heart. It  gives me great pleasure knowing that there are fellow book lovers like me. Oh, I have great designs for this blog. Ask Nimue or Pulkit, we talk about everything we can do to make it huge, active and popular. [Damn! am turning into a bookslut]


Anyway, enough DRAMA. What I wanted to say is that, the awesome person who posts the most reviews every month will get a free gift. And yeah, sadly its gonna be a book and not movie tickets or Pizza Hut coupons. And yes, Freelancer's reviews will not be included. So you can breathe a little easy.


Also, the book will be decided by the admins or me [if an admin wins]. Don't worry I won't send you a fantasy book [even though i would very much want to turn you into a fantasy fanatic]. Hehe. Anyway, this is just my stupid way of saying thanks. And yeah, this month is included too. Nimue leads with Maithili and MSM closely behind.


Okay am going now. Am bad at goodbyes. *wipes fake tears*

Kind Attention Please!

Dear Members/Readers and Signed up Reviewers of A Lot of Pages,

It has been really disappointing and frustrating to notice that the so-called-Book-Lovers have NOT been reviewing even the least expected number of TWO books a month. The Admins alone cannot hold the ground, for, the reason of your joining this place is our mutual admiration for books and the need to share it with everyone else. However, the dwindling number of reviews and the same names doing the work, sort of, shows that may be passion to read has been diminishing in the people who have joined us in this quest to read on A Lot of Pages.

It is understanble that some of you have examinations at the moment (We do too!) and other important works and would rather not savor the pages of a book. However, if your reasons are genuine enough and you are unable to post for any given month, just send an email to the A Lot of Pages Id (alotofpages@gmail.com) stating why you would not be able to do so. We are not monsters. We understand. This would keep us informed so that we can look for alternatives. Non-information and No Posts reflect badly on the Blog that may be we are not convincing enough for the Book Lovers to do a review for us.

Following are the Additional Set of Instructions for smooth functioning, which are in effect immediately from December 1st 2011: 

• The Admins can give a maximum lax for TWO months without completing the Quota of 2 reviews per month;
•  By the succeeding 3rd month, the Pending Reviews  including the monthly quota have to be up i.e. to say if you are unable to do a review for a month, in the succeeding month, you will have to do a total review of 4 books.

(!) Non-adherence with this condition empowers the Admins to BAR you from doing any further reviews on A Lot Of Pages.

• Also, it would be great if we could find the readers/reviewers, who visit here regularly, to contribute actively instead of gracing us only for the GIVEAWAYS.

Disclaimer: This notice is not intended to pressurize anyone, for we cannot force anyone to read. Reading is a passion and it comes naturally, irrespective of anything. Reading should be like hunger, which you need to satiate. Therefore, this notice shall be taken as a slight reprimand to remind you of the passion you might just have forgotten and neglected. The Admins do not hold any personal grudge against anyone. Thank you!

Much Regards,

The Admins