BBAW Interview Swap with...Alison McCarty!

 Happy BBAW everyone!  I am just returning from my SIBA trip so this is my first dip into the week...the Interview Swap.  I was assigned to correspond with a new-to-me-blogger, Alison McCarty.

Alison is actually a neighbor of mine (sort of)...she lives in Jacksonville.  I was also pleasantly surprised to find that she and I have many bookish tastes in common.  I'll definitely be adding her to my reader!  So do you want to get to know a little more about Alison?  Wait until you read her answers to my questions.  You are going to love her!

  
1.  I noticed that you have a very bookish career as a librarian and a copy cataloger. (Can you hear the universal sigh of envy from all the other bloggers out there?) Does your work influence your reading choices? 

Goodness, I love being a librarian. All the books, all the time! I only wish I could sit at the desk and read all day long. And working at two libraries definitely means I have piles and piles of books at home that my husband just shakes his head at. :) With cataloging, especially, I am constantly holding books in my hands and adding them to my long list of holds at the library. But even for all that, I don't end up reading all of the books I bring home — sometimes I forget why I even wanted to read a particular book in the first place! So it's good that I have other bloggers around to remind me to go read all the excellent books. 

 2. How and why did you get started blogging, and how long have you been blogging? 

Way back in undergrad (okay, it wasn't that long ago), I realized I wasn't reading any books for fun and dedicated the summer after my sophomore year to my "Summer Reading Project," for which I made a super-dorky and basic HTML page to remind myself of what I'd read. I did it again after junior and senior years, and at the end of that last summer I was like, "Wait, I'm a real person now and I can do my summer reading project all year 'round!" So I put together a blog like all the cool kids were doing and here I am! I've been "actual" blogging since late August or early September of 2008, so BBAW is like my own blog-iversary celebration! (Sandy side note:  Congratulations! We started almost at the same time.) 

3. What do you do for entertainment outside of blogging? 

As I type this, I am six hours away from my house, recovering from three hours of swing dance workshops and preparing to go dancing again! So I think it's safe to say I find swing dancing (primarily lindy hop and East Coast) to be highly entertaining. I also play French horn in a community orchestra and like to wander lost through the woods in an obscure "sport" called geocaching. I am clearly a giant nerd.  (Sandy side note:  Alison, my kids and I are totally obsessed with geocaching.  So much fun, but a crazy sucker-of-time!)

4. I always tell people that I love Tana French so much, I would bear her children. Are there any authors out there that you feel passionately about?

Tana French, omg, I love her. Not sure about the children part, but love love love! I also have a thing for Jasper Fforde, or maybe just the inside of Jasper Fforde's brain, which must be a very surreal landscape. These are definitely two authors who could write a phone book and I would read it. 

5. What has been your favorite read in 2012 so far? 

Oh, man. Off the top of my head, I'd have to say The Fault in Our Stars, which is an amazing and wonderful and terribly sad novel. Add John Green to that phone-book-writer list!  (Sandy side note:  I would agree with you on this one 100%.  One of the best books this year!  And at SIBA, I got a TFIOS poster!  OMG!)

6. Tell us something about yourself that would surprise us. 

Well, based on question 1, it's probably surprising that I rarely really go to the library. I put all of the books I'm interested in on hold, and when they come in I swoop over to the library (which is separate from where I work in cataloging), check them out, and go home! When I do go to the library properly, though, it's always a fun time. :)


Alison, thank you so much for taking the time to answer these questions.  I hope everyone enjoyed it, and take a peek at her blog!