As I keep working on my book, and on the future of this newsletter, I thought I’d take a break from slinging traditional book reviews and dive into a more essay-filled autumn.
Today, I’m exploring a couple of big questions that often loom over this publication: Who am I reading for? Who am I writing for?
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When I started this newsletter in 2018, I had a couple dozen, family members, and colleagues subscribed. At that time it was called “What I’m Reading” and the gist was simple: write a review or two about the book(s) I finished that week. It was purely driven by my own reading interests and served as a personal creative outlet on top of the work I was doing at Art of Manliness.
After a couple years of steady and dedicated promotion, I grew the list to a few thousand readers and the newsletter even started to make a little bit of money. At the same time, bookish communities and influencers started popping up elsewhere on the web, especially Instagram (and later TikTok). Books became one of the niche subjects that generated a whole industry of content creators.
As someone who has always loved books and reading — a love which sometimes veers into obsession — gaining influence and status in this world was deeply satisfying. It still feels like a superpower to be able to reach out to any publishing house and get review copies of any upcoming book I want.
As bookish communities continued to grow, the algorithm helped my newsletter, and in late 2022 I cracked 5,000 readers. It felt like a huge moment — and it also began to change how I read. It subconsciously shifted from a personal endeavor to something more public, and therefore something a bit more performative.
It wasn’t just about what I wanted to read anymore, but what did my community of readers want? What did those publishers — whose relationships I really valued, because they were new and fresh and exciting — want me to read and talk about? What kinds of themes or lists could I put together that would go viral and draw in more readers? I was no longer reading for curiosity alone, but for content.
That kind of thinking impacted my writing; it became a bit less personal and a bit more “please the masses.” It also deeply affected my own reading. For years now I’ve read with an inextricable mix of obligation and freedom, probably tending more towards obligation if I’m being honest.
When I’m choosing what to read next, I can’t help but think of the audience — now over 14,000 readers — and what you will think of my selections. Too nerdy? Too boring? Too political? Too out there?
In trying to find the most common denominator, I’ve unintentionally turned my own reading life into a status-concerned hustle rather than a source of joy. Don’t get me wrong: I still love reading and I generally really like what I’ve read in the last seven years. I just know that I overthink my reading life based on my predictions of how the internet will respond.
For the last month or so, though, I haven’t been writing reviews on a weekly basis. For the first time in a handful of years, I’m reading purely based on my own whims. And it’s kind of wild. I can’t entirely decide what I’m into these days, but it’s been really fun trying to figure it out.
“I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.” —Joan Didion
The internet does something to our brains. We know this. There are too many books about it and I’ve read too many of them. What’s interesting is how I’ve seen it in action in my reading life. Seeing subscriber numbers go up changed my entire approach to something that initially started purely out of passion.
Now, I won’t say that everyone would respond in the same way — because I don’t think they would. I think I’m wired in a way that is especially sensitive to those dopamine hits that come with online influence. And I’m a little too wary of losing it.
After so many years of yearning for more though — more readers, more influence, more side hustle revenue — I’ve finally hit a point of enough. I’m too aware that the internet tricks us (because it’s tricked me) into thinking those things matter way more than they actually do.
I don’t know what the future of this newsletter holds, but it probably looks like less publishing and more sailing into the waters of the weird, sometimes dense, and often random books I like to read. It probably looks like more essays rather than just reviews. And, with any luck, it looks a bit more authentic and true to who I am. After all, there’s a cardinal rule of writing I have yet to truly embody: Write for yourself.
-Jeremy
Bravo, Jeremy. Well said. Anxious now to see what you have to say in the future; not because I expect you to anticipate my needs, but because I want to see what you want to offer.
..."and more sailing into the waters of the weird, sometimes dense, and often random"...
I suspect the more you do it for you, the more we'll enjoy the ride. Count me in!