Category Archives: Reading

So many books…

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I feel like I’ve written this post before. I have a lot of books — books cause only mild guilt when I purchase them. When I can purchase them for a discount, for instance at Costco, all the better. Add that to being in two book groups and the long wait-time for popular books at the local library. Nearly every room in this house has a book or two (or a dozen) waiting to be read.

Besides the bookshelf filled with double-shelved books in my bedroom, most of which I want to read, I’ve got Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand sitting on my (bookshelf) headboard, face-down, open to the page I stopped reading a couple of nights ago. On my dresser is Let the Great World Spin, the book both book groups read and discussed that I got halfway through and found too boring to finish. (I don’t like books that are made up of short stories, even if they are connected by something). On Dean’s side of the headboard of the bed is The Siege of Krishnapur, another bookgroup read that I got partway through. I do plan to read all of these books.

In the living room I have more bookshelves filled with mostly read, but some unread books. On the table next to the couch are two more books. One is a bookgroup book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and a book I bought to read for fun, Fingersmith. I’m on page 23 of Henrietta Lacks and find it, okay but not exciting. I really want to read Fingersmith. but don’t feel right starting it with so many other books partway read.

The family room holds more bookshelves with double-shelved books as does Clare’s room. My office has work-related books I should read, especially since I’m planning on going back to work full-time in the fall.

It is not that I don’t have time to read — I have oodles of free-time, but I spend it on the Internet or watching television. Is it possible that I don’t like to read anymore? Has the Internet or aging changed my love of the written word?

I blame part of it on belonging to book groups — I don’t read non-book group books when I have a book group book to read out of guilt but don’t like the assigned books so don’t read at all.

I’d quit one or both book groups but they are pretty much the extent of my non-family related social life. Without them I’d be even more of a hermit.

This is an ongoing question, and a real problem for me — not the number of books in the house, but the number of books I want/need to read. Something needs to change and I don’t know what it will be.

Update: I read more of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks last night (about 1/3 of it) and am out of my reading slump. I’m really enjoying it now. Let’s hope it lasts!

Will they or won’t they?

Reading,

Book group is tonight and we’re discussing The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I didn’t expect to love this book — but I did. And I’m worried I might be the only one.

I heard about this book a while back, probably online somewhere. Then when we went to dinner with Clare and her then boyfriend for her birthday her boyfriend mentioned that his mom read it so he picked it up and read it.

Then Mali mentioned it in a blog post, although I had to look up Millennium Trilogy to know that was what she was talking about.

I suggested this book to my book group and one or two people thought there would not be enough to discuss, being a mystery and all. I’m glad the woman who is hosting thought it would be a good read, because I might not have read it otherwise.

The last book group book I loved was disliked by most of the group. I think I wrote about it before. I actually felt betrayed — and stupid. So when I like something no one else does — I’m stupid. When I don’t like something everyone else does — I’m stupid. Maybe I should just quit book groups…

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is good in a Da Vinci Code kind of way, but I think it is smarter — and takes place in Sweden. What’s not to like? And I do think we can find things to discuss about it — like was it a woman’s book or a man’s? And why does the male main character get all the women?

Ok, my ride’s here — wish me luck.

12 months of listening

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Last year I did a dumb thing. My mom gave me money for Christmas and I wanted a small mp3 player that was not manufactured by Apple so I could download audio books to listen to when I felt like it. I noticed that audible.com was offering $100 off on a number of mp3 players through Amazon (who, I found out recently, owns audible.com) if I signed up for a year of audible.com. I didn’t read the fine print and was dismayed to find out (after making the purchases & agreeing to the legal stuff on audible.com) the subscription was about $15 a month. Hmm, I thought, maybe if I don’t buy any book group books for the year and use my 1 credit a month for the audio version of the books I’ll break even.

So, I went with that plan and downloaded audio books of the books chosen for book group.

That plan might have worked had I commuted a long distance to work. That plan might have worked if I walked or used exercise equipment. That plan might even have worked if I remembered to grab my mp3 player when I did household chores like laundry or cleaning the bathroom.

Unfortunately I did none of the above, but thought that since my work was mainly rote and didn’t really use much brain power, I could listen to my audio books while working. I really believed I could. I told people this was working. I did get through some books this way and thought I was so smart to have thought of it.

I realized last week that I’d been lying to myself and everyone else. I was not really understanding much of what was going on in most of the books I listened to this way and that was probably why I did not like most of the books chosen for book group this year — I didn’t really “get” most of them and didn’t finish several because of it.

What worried me was this: I thought that I’d lost my love of literature. That I didn’t like the audio books because I didn’t like to read anymore. It was a very depressing thought since reading is part of how I define myself: I am a reader and I love to read. Since I realized that it was the listening to the books while working that probably made me not like them I tried to really read again. I finished a book I started in the summer (Naked by David Sedaris) and started a book that Andrew gave me for Christmas (The Little Stranger by Sara Waters) and am happy to say I still love to read. Naked is very funny and The Little Stranger is a gripping Gothic ghost story.  Whew!

Don’t get me wrong, I really do believe that a person can listen to a book and get as much out of it* as someone who reads the same book, but I no longer think that I can listen to books and work on even mindless tasks at the same time.

So I’ve got 4 credits (and a $10 credit for some reason) left on my audible.com account and will download a few books I’d been meaning to read — but won’t listen to them while doing anything more taxing with my brain than chores or walking or driving — and cancel my account with audible.

I guess I can chalk it up as a year long experiment. Albeit one that failed.

*what a person gets out of listening versus reading might be a little different — but can be pretty much the same. Some people just don’t like to listen to books some cannot concentrate on them, but if one does like listening and can concentrate then the experience can be close to the same as reading a book.