“Booktubers”
are people on Youtube who make videos related to books. Basically they are like
people who write book reviews on sites like Amazon and Goodreads, except they
make their reviews in video format. The video format can possibly have an
advantage over the text format because the people giving their reviews can
sometimes be more entertaining when actually speaking themselves.
In
general, all of these Booktubers make book reviews. But the way the reviews are
done are not always the same. First, they sometimes do things called “Book
Hauls.” This is when the reviewer gets a number of books at a library or
bookstore and talks about them all in one video. In the videos I saw, they
usually set a goal to read the described books within that month.
One
unique thing I saw among Booktubers were the Bookshelf videos. This was where
the Booktuber toured their entire bookshelf (or bookshelves) and gave a brief
description of the books they had and what they thought of them. I thought this
was the most interesting thing, because I could see how other people organized
their books. My bookselves are all overflowing and disorganized, so those
videos gave me a few ideas of how I could get them all back in order.
The
Booktubers I watched were:
The Readables
Just Kiss My Frog
Danny Marks
I glanced at a few other profiles but I mostly watched
these. I can’t say which I really liked the best, but I found all three of
these to be decent enough to watch. I think in order for these to be enjoyable
the Booktuber does at the very least need to have an interesting perspective on
the books and have decent audio and video quality. I don’t really mind if the videos are edited
to jump from one thing to the next though.
I am
going to sound like a huge hypocrite here but if you are going to have
bookshelves in the background of your video, they should at least look nice.
Like I said before, my bookshelves are all messy and overflowing, but I’m not
exactly making a video of it either. None of the Booktubers had that problem
though.
As for
how blunt you should be in a book review video, I think that all depends on the
reviewer. Yes you should give an honest review. But how you come across in that
video all depends on the online persona the Booktuber has created for
themselves. For example, lets say a Booktuber has a lot of subscribers and they
all find it very entertaining when the reviewer is comically snobbish in
reviews. So, since that is what their audience enjoys, it would make since for
the reviewer to make videos in that style. The reviewer’s personality might not
in reality be like that, but that may be their “character” when making videos.
I hope my meaning is clear on this.
I could
probably make decent book review videos if I tried. I find it a lot easier to
talk to a camera than to people in real life, so that wouldn’t be an issue. I
doubt that would happen though since I don’t have the time to make book review
videos.
I think
this whole Booktuber thing is an interesting idea, and if you are looking for book
reviews this may be something to look into. However, as much as I do love
books, I can’t really feel myself compelled to subscribe to any of these
reviewers on Youtube. I might look up some of their videos every now and then
though.
