One year ago today, Sarah and I posted our first official Smart Bitch entries, to wit: A review of The Unsung Hero by Suzanne Brockmann and a review of Angel-Seeker by Sharon Shinn.
Here are some statistics for our site at the time of writing, pulled off the little Statistics sidebar provided by ExpressionEngine:
- Number of page views for the front page: 778,474 (according to my calculator, that’s an average of just under 2133 page views a day)
- Total combined hits for all pages: 1,781,187 (average of just under 4880 hits a day)
- Total number of comments: 10,757
- Total Smart Bitchery Members: 245
- Most visitors ever: 163 on 11/23/2005 at 11:40 a.m.
HOLY SHIT.
If you’d told Sarah and me that a year from now we’d be looking at statistics like those, we would’ve laughed. HARD. Especially in those early days, when all our referrers were basically porn spambots, when the “most visitors ever” counter showed something like 5 people, and the only regular readers were probably Sarah’s sister and my best friend from Malaysia, Sooks.
So, Happy Birthday to this site. This first year has been a motherfuckin’ blast, and thanks to all of you who drop by, post comments, send Sarah and I hideous covers to make fun of, nudge our way towards interesting stories and developments, and give us love and snark in equal measure. You’re the wind beneath our wings. *happy tear*
Sarah Adds:
Thank you also to everyone who has sent us recommendations of books to read, and actual books to read, from backlist editions to ARCs – we read the past and future of romance? Boo yah!
This site came about because we had an entirely tangential conversation about our love of romance novels, and how hard it is to find people who like to talk about romance as if it were a genre worthy of critical examination and review, just the same as any genre. So I want to thank you, our Bitchery readership, for affirming my faith that there are people out there who are snarky and smart, intelligent and witty, AND who like romance novels. It’s a pleasure to read your comments and interact with all of you!
