Avid Reader? Hah! Not lately....

You know, for someone who bills herself as a voracious reader, and for someone who loves to read (and I really, really love to read) I've not been doing a great deal of it lately. Or I've still been doing it, it's just not making me as happy as is usually does. Except for the aforementioned Owly.

I seem to have hit a rough patch - which happens occasionally. Nothing seems to really fit the bill, nothing really grips me, or is enjoyable enough that I feel the need to pass it on. In the past few weeks, I've mired through some best seller stuff - legal thrillers, the new Jody Picoult, etc. - and while none of it was great, none of it was terrible. Except for the latest Baldacci, The Camel Club which I thought was a big clunker.

I've had a bunch of books come in that I was very excited about at the time that I put them on reserve at the library, but can't seem to muster up the enthusiasm for now that they are here. I've got Sophie's Choice, which I am having a devil of a time getting into. (I'd never read it, and it just seemed like I should.) I've got this amazing biography of William Faulkner that I had to wait to get for something like 3 months. Now that's it's here, I just can't muster up the strength to dive in. I feel somewhat guilty - I keep wanting to mutter to these neglected books "It's not you, it's me!"

I just get like this sometimes - where no matter what I read, it's just meaningless. I suspect it has less to do with the books that I am reading and more to do with some sort of snit or funk in which I have found myself. The next book I am going to attempt is Peyton Place. There was a very interesting article all about it in this month's Vanity Fair, and I realized that I'd never read it, either. I'm betting it's a way easier read than Sophie's Choice...