Grateful thanks to Limelite forlast week's Tuesday Readers & Book Lovers diary. Not only did I have sketchy internet access, but was with people who don't think Christmas Eve should be spent talking with imaginary friends online or watching A Christmas Story more than once. Do check it out if you haven't yet for the recommendations.
I could say I plan to read some of the ones I haven't yet read in the next month or so, but I would probably by lying. Not because I don't want to read them, but because I know better than to make promises like that.
Some people have it within themselves to make resolutions, to make plans and stick to them. When it comes to reading, I like the theory but its application leaves a lot to be desired.
Let's face it. I'm like that dog in the cartoon that loses focus every time someone says "Squirrel! as far as reading plans are concerned. I can't even put up a "what I'm reading next" list because it's not like I'm going to stick with it. So an actual resolution? That's a promise that will be broken before it's given.
Part of this is due to my reading life. It includes children's, middle grade and YA fiction and nonfiction for work (note to anyone who enjoys fantasy and fairy tales: the middle grade novels The Real Boy by Anne Ursu and upcoming Ophelia and the Marvelous Boy by Karen Foxlee are sublime). It also includes professional books and journals (I dip into Donalynn Miller's The Book Whisperer and Reading in the Wild to shake off the standardized test/Common Core blues).
It includes genre fiction (Donna Leon's upcoming Brunetti, By Its Cover, is a great addition to that series and a wretching look into the world of purloined rare books and pages of rare books from libraries, and Joe Hill's NOS4A2 is one of the best books about addiction and families I've read in some time, as well as one helluva adventure and horror story).
It includes history and biography (I've been enjoying Nathaniel Philbrick's Bunker Hill and have gleefully read the beginning of Fred Kaplan's upcoming biography of John Quincy Adams). It includes being active in online communities, writing reviews, critiquing other writing to encourage others to develop their craft.
It includes classics (October saw yet another re-read of The Moonstone that was yet again as satisfying as the first time I found Wilkie Collins's uber detective story). And, of course, it includes contemporary literary fiction because I discovered A.S. Byatt's Possession at a time I hungred for story, character and something deeper.
With all those competing reading wants and needs fighting for attention, I have tried to stick to reading plans and just cannot.
There also is the allure of something new, something remembered, something hungered for, something that pops up at just the right time -- and the rewards of the last cannot be overestimated. If something unexpected shows up and calls out, then that is what to read. It will never let you down, even if it takes some time for the reason to appear.
Whether you can create a plan and keep to it, whether you read as an omnivore or prefer to explore a certain kind of writing deeply, perhaps you can make the same resolution that I can keep. I plan to read as much and as often as possible in the year that begins at midnight.
Readers & Book Lovers Series Schedule: