Undersea Spotlight: Karin at My Life…

Posted by Jessi (Geo) on October 2, 2012 | 1 Comment

I started this feature here at ASR in order to know your fellow bloggers a little better! If you are interested in being featured please fill out the form.

Meet Karin!

My name is Karin and I am a 26-year-old book lover. I live in Vienna, the beautiful capital of Austria – Austria not Australia. So the only kangaroos we have here are the ones in the zoo. Someday, in the near future hopefully, I will be teaching high school students in English and Geography but in the meantime I tutor them in English.
I share my home with my 3 year old dog, Felix, and a huge wall covering bookcase.

How long have you been blogging? What made you want to start a book blog?

If been blogging for over three years now. I started a blog showing my photography back in 2010. It started as a New Year’s Resolution and grew into a two year project were I posted on photo a day, which really helped me develop me photography skills. In 2011 I had this strong urge to talk about my passion for books too, and started a small book blog. I wrote it in English because even though I’m no English native I read 99% of my books in English and it was easier for me to write about them in the language I read them.
Last year in October I merged my photo and book blog together and created “My Life…” which is mainly a book blog but also features some photographs and my rambling about life in general.

What do you do when you’re not blogging or reading?

When I’m not blogging or reading I can either be found behind a camera taking pictures, out with my friends, enjoying some coffee and a good chat or walking the woods with my dog. I also love all kinds of music, movies and TV series.

What is your favorite part about blogging? Least favorite?

I love talking to other book lovers. The bookish community is amazing and it is so fabulous to have people who are as addicted to books as you are. Due to the fact that I’m living in Europe we don’t have that many/any author events and we also tend not to travel far for a signing, so I sadly haven’t met any other book bloggers. But I hope that I will manage to go to the Netherlands soon and meet two of my all time favorites Kat from The Aussie Zombie and Daisy from Between the Pages. I would also love to meet Dani from Pen and Paper.
My least favorite part is that sometimes we turn against one person who made a mistake and literally freeze this person out. This is not cool and I think we should acknowledge that we are all human and that mistakes can happen. I also find it irritating that so many blogs shut down during 2012 because they were attacked by others. Same here – not cool and really sad! We should be a community, sticking together not turning against each other.

Where did you come up with the name for your blog?

I was talking to my mum, telling her that I would like to combine my two blogs but that I had no idea what to name the blog. When she asked me what I wanted to write about I answered: “Just about life.” and the name was created.

Do you have any specific book bloggers that inspire you?

One of the first blogs I discovered was The Broke and Bookish which really attracted me because of their Top Ten Tuesday meme. I am a huge list maker so this meme draw my attention to it. From this blog I started blog hopping and creating a huge list of fabulous blogs. Before I started my own blog I made a list (see, it’s a recurring theme here) of things I would like to have on my blog, features I liked, memes I wanted to participate in and thought a lot about the way I wanted my blog to be. So I clearly was inspired by book blogs but honestly, there were so many that I cannot really remember all of them.

What do you look for in a blog when following? What are your pet peeves?

I love reading good and honest reviews. So if the blogger talks about a book she/he hasn’t liked and doesn’t trash the book, I really respect them for that. I also love to read memes and reviews of books that I would not pick normally. I discovered some great reads from blogs I follow.
Pet peeves….I get really disappointed if a blogger hosts a lot of giveaways but they all are US/Canada only. When something like that happens I feel like this blogger doesn’t acknowledge that there are readers outside of North America and that makes me angry and sad.

What’s your favorite book(s)?

I think that is the toughest question here! Okay, honestly I don’t have a favorite book. I love reading and books so much that I would always feel as if I treated some books unfair if I picked a favorite.

Favorite author?

Janet Evanovich, Ali McNamara, Gail Carriger, Terry Pratchett.

What is the biggest turn off for you when you’re reading a book?

I hate it when a main character is really weak or behaves like a helpless little kid. These are major turn offs for me.

What first draws you to a book to make you want to read it?

I usually select a book via three criteria:

The cover – but I also own books with not so pretty or boring covers because the blurb sounded amazing.
How many pages the book has – the thicker the better.
The blurb – if I am not convinced to buy it at that point I won’t buy it because I’m pretty sure I won’t like it.

Describe yourself in 3 words.

Optimistic, reliable and sarcastic.

Name a random fact about yourself.

My mum and I are constantly dreaming about owning our own café/bookstore. We would rent a place near a school and provide muffins, brownies, bagels and good coffee for all the students and teachers and the rest of the day we would spend trying new recipes, reading books and managing our own little place of heaven.

[Jessi] That sounds fabulous!

Do you have a job? If so, what do you do?

Right now I am a full time student for English and Geography, training to become a teacher. I am tutoring kids in English too, but maybe this will soon change. I got a job offer to work as a Geography teacher in a school and I will find out if my application is through soon. So maybe I will be a teacher in some weeks time.

What did you want to be when you were little? Has that changed?

I always wanted to be a teacher, but after high school graduation I studied economics for two years (the university system in Austria is different then the one from the US). I soon realized that it wasn’t the right choice and switched to teacher training, on which my mum commented with the word “Finally!”. So I guess it was pretty obvious for everybody else (including my Geography teacher in 7th grade) that I would be a teacher one day.

Randomness

Cats or dogs?

Dogs, definitely dogs. I am the proud owner of a happy and beautiful Australian Shepherd mix named Felix. He is my second dog – the first one was a Spaniel named Nico, who convinced my family of the need of a dog in the house.

White, dark, or milk chocolate?

I would say dark chocolate but not like 70% cocoa. Those are way to bitter for my taste but around 50% is just perfect!

Coke or Pepsi?

Coke – preferably Diet Coke.

Favorite TV show?

Friends, Gilmore Girls and Castle (my Friday night is absolutely perfect if I can join Richard, Kate, Kevin and Javier solving murders in New York City).

Movie?
I love Jennifer Aniston and Katherine Heigl movies. I would categorize myself as a huge fan of romantic comedies. If I have to pick my favorite movie I would say “The Ugly Truth” with Katherine Heigl and yummy Gerard Butler.

Color?
I love bright warm colors – like red, orange, and yellow, but also blue in every range. If you really want to know my favorite color I would go with red. It is the one color I’m always drawn to and it, amazingly, doesn’t clash with my coppery hair color.

Thanks for being here today, Karin! It was fantastic getting to know you :)