so. Ahem. I have this sort of book blog, you know, but …er, I have finished exactly three books since January 2012. That’s three books in six months.
hum.
I have started more than 40 books. I have completed about the first 1/3 of all of these books and I fully intend to go back and finish them. I do! I will go back and finish these books because they’re well written and I like the characters and I want to know what hap…*yawn*…pens.
Is it me? Is it my concentration issues flaring up again? Is it my cynical intolerance for the same old shit over and over again that’s preventing me from completing a novel? Am I just a snotty asshole? Am I losing interest in reading altogether?
Like Sherlock, shooting holes in the wall: I’m bored.
I’ll tell you what I am reading. I am reading the short stories collected in Mike Allen’s Clockwork Phoenix anthologies. I am going out and seeking the books/stories/poems/art/podcasts/whatevers that these writers have gone on to publish since these anthologies were published. It’s tough to list these finds on my list of books that I’ve read (adding to that number “three” up there, I mean) because much of this material isn’t a book.
These are (note that I’m adding these links here with the intention that you will follow them and thus be able to help me figure out what I’ve found):
- short stories (Primo Levi),
- more short stories (Mike Allen)
- and more short stories (Shweta Narayan)
- poems (Catherynne Valente),
- umm…little single chapbooks sort of that were published in a hand-made, hand-bound book (several authors),
- games
- collaborations between brush-and-paint artists/writers (Dragonhenge)
- (sometimes they’re the same person: Brian Selznick),
- podcasts (Tales to Terrify)
- beer labels (yeah, I said “beer labels”)
- and songs, songs, songs.
I’m working out why these stories and writers are so intriguing. I’m trying to put quantifications on how these writers are pushing boundaries. I don’t think I have the literature and vocabulary skills to be able to do that, but I do know that the beta-reading project I’m doing for Mike Allen is clogging up my brains and getting in the way of every other novel I’ve tried to read since starting that project in January.
I am devouring this new wave of story-telling-whatever-this-meta-trans-media-multi-genre-stuff. Not all of these are novels, or even written word, but they’re all new ways to tell a story. I’m excited to see how this develops as we shed the need for mass-market paperbacks. To make the food metaphor: just because it’s organic doesn’t make it appetizing.
Maybe I’m not book bored. Maybe I just have new appetites?
Is that Jasper Fford’s Eyre Affair on the top of the stack? That’s a good book.
I’ll finish it! I swear!
I do notice these are all short. You can have the ending quickly, say it’s all great, no waiting in line or wading thru boring bits to get done with character development and onto the plotline again.
And that is all good. I’ll only worry if you stop reading all together.
Well, sort of. Yes, the definition of a short story is that it’s short. But that doesn’t mean that it’s empty of content or character development.
I didn’t put up web comics–why didn’t I put up web comics? There’s another story medium worth exploring.
I’m not alone in this, tho. For example, Duncan has read maybe six novels in the last two years. He’s been reading web comics, RPG manuals and engaging in the stories of video games.
hey, we both read beer labels!
do you obsessively read cookbooks too? when my brain doesn’t want to concentrate on a novel, I read cookbooks.
speaking of cookbooks – for those of us who only read books (that would be me), it’s like I’m only shopping the produce section of the grocery store. Sure, I get some healthy stuff, but i’m missing out on the bakery, the deli, the meat counter, greek yogurt, the burts bees display, and my favorite section of the grocery store – the junk food aisle. Occassionally I get my Girl Genius or my Ai Yazawa manga, but I’m mostly a really boring book vegan.
so I say enjoy the rest of everything! grow new appetites! try something you’ve never had before! send it back to those of us who feel guilty when we stray from the organic section.
I pulled in too many metaphors again for this blog post– I do that a lot.
I have been spending half a year feeling guilty for not being interested in what I’m reading enough to finish the book I started. I have always been a reader of books published by the huge publishing industry FIRST, and then second I’ll look to small presses and then on to other sources.
I had a revaluation that it is perfectly ok for me to not have to read the books from these big publishers, the mass-marketed, mass-produced line of fiction. Just because it’s “supposed” to be good, doesn’t mean that it is.
Why not look to my local, small, individually owned publications?
I really like what Mike Allen writes. Why not investigate what likes to read? Likely I’ll enjoy that, too.
I’m sorry, I can’t focus on much after reading the name Primo Levi up there. He’s one of my favorite writers and though I haven’t read his dedicated short stories yet, his book of essays and short stories The Periodic Table is truly excellent and one of the most unique books I’ve ever read.
Anyways, I think it’s normal to go through different reading periods. Sometimes that means reading a lot of similar books, sometimes it means hardly reading, and sometimes it means branching out to completely new and unfamiliar fields. Books are abandoned, tastes change subtly (or not-so-subtly), and eventually you find what you like.
YAY! someone who understands this Primo Levi *thing*! I am totally in love and obsessed with Primo Levi. The Periodic Table was …was… (this is why I haven’t posted a review yet).
If you can find a copy of The Mirror Maker, get it. They’re out of print. If you would like to borrow my copy, let me know.
And also thanks for that 2nd paragraph. I’m finding that I am enjoying something termed “weird”, as in “weird west”, which is kind of like horror but not so much my previous concepts of horror.