So I have posted several book reviews at this point in my newly birthed blog. So far so good. I am enjoying sharing my thoughts on a particular book and in many instances reminiscing about the characters and places in those stories. Many times I find myself thinking about the characters long after I have finished a book. They sort of continue to live with me for a while. And for the rare book which truly touched a cord in my heart, I'll find myself thinking of their "story" many months or even years after I've finished the reading. To me, that is truly the sign of a well written story. When it affects you so much that memories of the story pop up in your mind much the same way as memories of times with your family or your childhood spring into your thoughts at a given moment. That is not to say I cannot draw the distinction between reality and fantasy - I most definitely can keep this all in perspective. I wonder if this feeling of a book being a "part of you" is a kin to the feeling that many authors have when they say that their characters "speak" to them and "live" with them for a time. I wonder if this is a 6th sense sort of experience. Perhaps it is that connection that the author has to their characters and story that make their books have a similar affect on their readers?
As a kid I never really liked reading. I would read what was required of me as a student, but if the Cliff Notes version of a required novel was available - or better yet a movie! - I was all about taking a short cut. I guess the classics just did not peak my interest. I did read To Kill A Mockingbird all the way through. The same with The Scarlet Letter and Romeo and Juliet. But The Handmaid's Tale? Withering Heights? Cliff Notes baby! Shhhh...don't tell Mrs. Hall my high school English teacher. However, somewhere in my teenage years I discovered a book series called Sweet Valley High - don't look up copyright dates please let's all just pretend we are still 20-somethings. m'kay? This was a teenybopper version of a romance series and there must have been 100+ books in it. I think I read them all. And truth be told - they were not even that good. Reading choices for teens and young adults abound today as compared to when I was younger. However, many of the offerings cross a boundary into what I would consider to be adult reading material. I suppose this is the way of the world and not a shock when you compare that to what the kids are watching on TV and movies and listening to on their iPods these days. Still, I would steer my teenage daughter to better, more age appropriate alternatives - and then read those New Adult novels myself. <grin>.
I also find my tastes changing back and forth from time to time. I guess it is a little bit the same way with certain foods or taste in music. I was on a Subway sandwich kick for a while there. Tasty, cheap, easy...until I could not stomach the idea of one more 6" turkey on wheat or even the smell of the bread when you walk in the store. So I moved on to other culinary desires. I'm sure I'll be back in a Subway one day and will again sink my teeth into a good old meatball sammy with extra pickles. The same thing happens with my tastes in reading. My love for fiction really re-sparked several years ago with a series by Diana Gabaldon called Outlander. These are ginormous 900+ page novels (and to date there are 7 in the series) about a time traveling woman who goes back in time (accidentally) to the mid 1700s Scotland and falls in love with a highlander. It has romance, history, travel, sci-fi and is absolutely hands down my favorite of all time. When I took a break from the historical nature of that series I tried a few easy romance novels by the likes of Nora Roberts. Mehhhh...kinda like a Lifetime movie on paper. They are okay, just not moving or memorable in any way - kinda like that turkey sandwich. So I bounce around mostly within the genre of romance novels - but ones that have some substance. I even enjoy the occasional New Adult book. Many of these I have reviewed on Good Reads. Right now my kick seems to be on the contemporary romance but stories that provide more than just the same old-same old "boy meets girl" storyline. And as intriguing as Fifty Shades of Grey was (yes, I read all three...yummy!) those novels that are all about sex are not all that tantalizing after a while. Now a slow burn, teasing, smoldering "let's get to know each other" storyline - that is way sexier to me.
If you have a good book to recommend, please let me know. I'm all ears! Or should I say I'm all eyes?
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