mmerriam | Trying to Read More Books

I'm trying to get back into the habit of reading, because really. I know that, compared to most of my SF/F/H fandom peers, I am quite poorly read. This is a sad thing, because there was a time when I read daily, and went through books pretty quickly (about two a week at my peak). In fact, the single biggest complaint my ex-wife had was: "You've always got your nose stuck in a damned book!" That should have been a clue that she was destined to be an ex-wife.

But I digress.

Over the last few years, as real life and blindness and homeownership and just the general everyday mess of living has sucked up more and more of my time, I've been reading less and less. I've decided to change that. My goal is modest: Read two books a month. I'm hoping if I can get back into the habit of reading, I'll pick up speed again. The gods know I have enough unread books on my bookcases to keep me busy for sometime to come. So I've created a system where I pull a book off a different shelf each time, so that I'm constantly working through my bookcases and not, say, stuck reading the 15 David Eddings books we inherited from

careswen's grandmother, all in a row.

I finished Octavia Butler's Bloodchild last week, a birthday present from

markgritter,

mrissa, and

timprov (Thanks, guys!). It is a collection of her short fiction, and we all know how I love me some short fiction. I was blown away. I knew Butler was good (as in one of the Greats of Our Time) but I guess I had forgotten just how good she was. I had read a couple of these stories before ("Bloodchild" and "Speech Sounds," both of which I adore) and was pleased at how much I enjoyed the others, with "The Evening, and the Morning, and the Night" being my favorite of the ones I had not read.

And now I am reading Pamela Dean's Tam Lin because somehow I still have not read this book (I know! I know!), despite the fact that I've read her other works, and I've read all but one other of the Terri Windling Fairy Tale Series Books. I’m three chapters in, and am utterly charmed and captivated.