Book Nook

What I’m reading

As a child I could always be found with a book. In fact, books quieted down my occasional tantrums like candy and toys did for other kids.

I can’t even tell you how many books I read in my youth. I would often read five to six books in a week. There were, of course, the school required-reading books, but I also had favorite authors. Stephen King, VC Andrews, S.E. Hinton, and Danielle Steel were early favorites, with Maeve Binchy and Wally Lamb added in my 20s.

I wasn’t just passionate about particular authors, I also read everything about a subject once it interested me. Case in point was the education system in the mid-90s. I had enrolled in school to major in education and some of my favorite books on the topic at the time were There are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz, and Jonathan Kozol’s Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools and Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation.

But then social networks happened. First it was Migente.com, then MySpace, and following that, Facebook. My already lack of attention span decreased significantly. I stopped reading voraciously and only read occasionally.

In 2014 I tried to dedicate my summer to reading, didn’t happen. In 2016 I joined the Goodreads Reading Challenge with 12 books, it didn’t happen. So of course, in 2017 I rejoined the challenge, this time with 24 books, because of course if you don’t achieve your small goal, you make the goal bigger.

My mindset was different though. I thought of reading as a pre-requisite to writing. So many writers say, and I would quote one here if I could remember one, that to write you must read. So I believed this time would be different. And guess what!! It has been. It’s now about the end of February, and I’ve read eight books. Goodreads says I’m five books ahead of schedule.

So back to writing. If I”m reading, should my first attempts at writing again regularly be about my reading. Well, yes and no. I don’t think I’m going to get into book reviews, at least not now. But I’m excited about the books I’m reading, actually just about the fact that I’m reading, and I want to share them in some way. So I’m going to try something in the family of a book review. A book summary.

I introduce you to my new section, My Book Nook, named for the Nook I gave myself as a birthday gift, and the reading nook I will someday have in the little cozy house of my dreams.

Let’s read together!

Check out My Book Nook and/or find me on Goodreads.com.