The Need to Read!

There is a curious thing that happens to me… ridiculously often actually. Something that is almost shocking to admit… I run out of time to read!!

I know, horrifying!

How is this possible you wonder? Well, there is the usual stuff, you know, cooking, cleaning, work, sleep. Then there is the fact that a large portion of my job is dedicated to being online at not-necessarily sociable hours of the evening / night. None of that is enough to deter the truly determined though and that is where my shocking confession comes in. I just don’t always feel like it.

There, I said it! I’ll give you a moment to recover. You see, I love to read and I read really quickly, but I also really love to ENJOY the books that I read and that isn’t necessarily something that happens when you’re “fitting a book into your schedule”. So I set aside special time to go through my TBR pile. I get as far ahead of my work as I can, carve out a few days and then make sure I have a steady supply of tea or coffee, snacks and a comfy spot to just chill out. And then I just tune the world out. My phone is on silent, there’s nothing but the book and I.

Of course, there are times when I’ve committed to reading for review or as a beta reader and then I make the time.  I enjoy those books just as much because it’s something that will help that author.

There’s another situation that arises when I least expect it.  I will be busy working, having gone weeks without reading more than a snippet here or there (because seriously, I always have at least 1 book on the go at any given time!!) and then suddenly I will feel a burning desire to drop everything and escape into another world.  I’ve never been a substance addict, but from everything I’ve seen in movies, that’s what it’s like… if I don’t get my “fix”, I feel like I’ll go nuts.  And then reading becomes a guilty pleasure… like an extra slice of cake *grin*.

So… what are your reading habits like? Do you ever have this problem?

Until next time…

BM xx

The Magic of Words

There is something that anyone who loves reading can relate to and that is a love of words. Words are simple, a mere collection of letters ordered in a variety of ways. Those words are then arranged in any number of ways to form sentences and finally, those sentences are arranged to form paragraphs, paragraphs into pages, pages to chapters, chapters into books.

It is a kind of magic that is accessible to anyone. Once you’ve been taught the secrets of the letters and the words, you can create worlds to fire your imagination or you can simply escape into someone else’s.

With the power of words, you can travel through time, meet famous people from history, learn new skills or fall in love. Words allow you to break a heart, but words can also mend it.

Not everyone is as good with them, but that should never stop people from using them, practicing, trying. Write. Write what moves you. Write about happiness. Describe pain. Write to a friend. Write a diary. Create.

With words, we can shape and reshape ourselves.

Until next time,

BM xx

For Love of the Book

There is something about books.  Old books, new books, second hand books, borrowed books.  It really doesn’t bother me much, as long as I have them.  It’s not a small addiction, but at least I can absolutely credit my parents for giving it to me.  I firmly believe that their shared love of reading, of learning and their passion for books was handed down to us kids in the very air we breathed.  Our home was filled with books.  We were read to as infants, had books of our own as toddlers and small children and as we grew, our passion was indulged at every turn.  All in all, not a bad way to be raised.  To this day, I find it difficult to understand homes that have no (or very few) books in them.  It is as if I have a natural distrust of that emptiness.

Don’t get me wrong, I have some amazing friends who have uttered those dreadful words “oh, I don’t read much”.  It’s shocking, I know.  Subtle gifts of some of my favourite books have failed to entice them and I am resigned to the fact that they have fallen prey to the dark side. Ok, I jest.  Not quite on the dark side. However, I am comforted by the fact that we have other things in common and that I have built a large circle of like-minded book lovers with whom I can share my nuttiness.  A passion that has now lead to me following my heart into helping authors with their promotions.

In the same way that many of my childhood favourites will always be voiced by my Mother or my Father, no matter how many times I read them, being a part of the journey with an author weaves that book into the fabric of my life.  Adds them to my mental library as it were.

Let me tell you, it’s a journey that never gets old.

Best,

BM xx