10 Bookish Confessions

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish. There's a new book-related top ten list every single week and it is a great way to get to know other book-loving bloggers! Everyone is welcome to join in the weekly linky party, even if you can't think of TEN for a certain Tuesday (just think of as many as you can!), just make sure you link back to The Broke and the Bookish if you do!

This week's topic is:

TEN BOOKISH CONFESSIONS

Are these secrets? Some of them, for sure. Others are just me being me and those who are close to me would expect nothing else. Either way, I have not professed them all in such a public fashion as this week's list implores me to do so. So, before I even get started I'm going to ask you for forgiveness just in case anything that follows offends your bookish sensibilities. 

1. I currently owe the library just under $30 and three books! Who knows what the heck happened there. I have the NYPL iPhone app which allows me to renew my books from home, but I kept missing the date. Also, why haven't I finished reading The Maze Runner yet, anyway?! On Saturday, I decided I should just sit down, read it cover to cover and head back over to my library on Sunday. I'd been telling myself this ALL summer, but when I saw that I had to confess this week I gav myself the Sunday deadline. I didn't make it. I'm up to Chapter 21 in The Maze Runner and I had to return it! I think, by the end of this week, I'll probably break down and go take it out AGAIN!

2. I'm an "in-store" reader. I live down the block from a Barnes & Noble bookstore. Ever since the store opened my friends and family have come to know that if I am missing chances are you'll find me there. Due to this fact there are many books which I have read, cover to cover, while sitting in the store. I will hang out, read, take note of what page I'm on, and then pick it up on my next visit. Yes... it is like stealing, but very often I end up buying the book before I'm finished with it anyway. So far, I think I have only managed to complete an in-store read twice.

3. I like to write in my books. It was sophomore year of high school. I had purchased The Lord of the Flies to read in class and we had tons of notes to take on the story when it occurred to me: Why do I keep the notes in a separate notebook? Wouldn't it be easier to reference RIGHT HERE in my book? Well, that was it - I started taking notes in the book and LOVED the completed product. Not only was William Golding's entire tale held between the covers, but so was all that I had learned about it's symbolism, characterization, themes and author! I don't do this all of the time, but when I see a book as a learning experience I write ALL OVER IT. These days that happens in particular in books on the craft of writing like On Writing by Stephen King, Bird by Bird by Anne Lamont and The Memoir Project by Marion Roach Smith.

4. I prefer audiobooks to music. I don't know when this started exactly - probably when I first came home from the hospital after my diagnosis with Intracranial Hypertension. Audiobooks serve two purposes: they sweep me away to magnificent other worlds while calming me and resting my eyes. I am a super-fan of audiobooks when I am in the middle of doing chores I really want nothing to do with (ie. chances are if I am folding laundry, I am listening to a story!).

5. I just started re-reading. I have always been of the belief that there are far too many books in the universe for me to spend time re-read one that I have already experienced. However, I have spent a lifetime re-watching television shows and movies just for the sheer enjoyment - why didn't I understand that I deserved this same enjoyment in my reading life? I don't know why it took me so long to realize, but now that I have, I've been having a great time!

6. I love assigned reading. I enjoyed almost every single novel that was ever assigned to me to read in school. Therefore, after graduating high school and being freed from the lifestyle of assigned reading, I found myself at a loss for awhile as to what I should read next. It is for this reason that I find myself obsessed with reading lists of all kinds: from magazines, blogs and school. I collect these lists and perceive them as my own type of assigned reading. 

7. I loved the experience of reading the Twilight series. While the paranormal romance is not one of my favorite series that I ever read, the experience of reading the Twilight books is one that I look back on with nostalgia and hope to recapture again soon. I was teaching and noticed many students reading this book with an apple on the cover. I was excited they were reading at all and became curious myself. Then, a bunch of teachers decided to read the book all together. As I read the books and carried them with me, strangers would approach me discussing their own experience with the reading. It was something I had not experienced since reading Harry Potter and I thought it was magnificent: people were unified around reading! This is why I will always have fond memories of reading the entire Twilight series before the films came out.

8. I feel guilty when I don't want to read a book. Intellectually I know this is ridiculous. I have different tastes than others, different preferences and I should not have to read every book that is ever discussed in the public domain. However, I often feel guilty when I have no desire to read a book that is gaining popularity. This is, I believe, due to the joy I find in reading books with large groups of people (see #7 on this list), but I shouldn't have to convince myself to spend time reading a book I'm not interested in just to engage in literary conversations. Currently, I am having this issue with Fifty Shades of Grey, a book I have NO interest in reading that confuses my family because they are all enjoying it and I'm the one who "reads everything."

9. I'm a Disney kid. I grew up with Jimeny Cricket, Pinnocchio, Dumbo, Bambi and Cinderella in all of their animated glory. As the years passed I gobbled up more and more animated films from Disney Studios and never once questioned their interpretations. I know these stories as they were shown to me; it is only now, as an adult, that I am beginning to wonder how my worldview would have been affected had these stories been initially read to me. I have not read any of the Disney animated stories in the original form (except Winnie the Pooh and a bit of Alice In Wonderland). This is something I wish to rectify and perhaps will turn into a Rivera Runs Through It blog challenge now that I am thinking about it!

10. I judge books by their covers. I can't help myself, however, particularly when I am strolling around my Barnes and Noble, I get an impression when I see the cover of a book. Over the years I have stumbled upon some pretty awesome reads before they became super-popular just based on my own impression of their covers! Some examples I can remember are:  Life of Pi, The Lovely Bones, and The Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-Time. In each case, I saw the book, grabbed it and sat in a big comfy chair to start reading right away. I did not read the back cover, I just sat down and started reading page one (attempted "in-store" reads that were all purchased the day they were found) and couldn't stop!


That's it. Ten confessions from this book-chick. What about you? Are you ready to confess? Do you share some of my own weaknesses?! Share below in the comments!

Writers, Are You Reading?

Last night I was pretty surprised by the title of an article from GOOD magazine that showed up in my twitter stream. It was a simple enough question, but it perplexed me all the same:

Why Don't More Writers Buy Books?

I read the question over and over. I mean, honestly, buy more books? I'm drowning over here and I also owe the library some money as well! But, I happen to love GOOD magazine, they are usually straight forward and not completely irrational, so I thought let me click the link and actually read the article to see what this is all about.

What's This All About

When it comes down to it, the numbers were simply not adding up. Publishers and literary magazines are being overwhelmed with a growing number of querys and submissions for publication, but their books and magazines are not selling off the shelves. In a time when everyone is questioning the future of the publishing world, the number of aspiring writers has suddenly grown astronomically. Those behind the books got to thinking - if all these writers were supporting the industry they want to be a part of then, perhaps, its future wouldn't be in question at all!

It ends up that this article that found new life on Twitter last night is actually from July 2010, but I wonder how off the mark it is. Without access to the data myself, or my own behind the scenes look into the publishing world, all I can offer is my own perspective and opinion on this subject.

My Thoughts 

Personally, I believe if you are going to submit work to a literary magazine for a possible submission, you should read that magazine. If you are going to continually submit to the same literary magazine, you should probably just subscribe to it. This is not just to support the industry, but also to know what types of work they are looking for and tend to publish.

The same goes with larger publishing dreams. If you want to write a romance novel, well, then, read romance novels. If you want to write mystery, then read mystery. Whatever it is that you are writing, you should become familiar with what's going on in the genre. You should know what is popular, what's been done and where you fit.

By the way, in my opinion, you should be reading a little bit of everything else also. You never know where you will get inspiration for your latest work, or what kind of author voice will move you until you are face to face with it. Learning happens in the strangest of places, usually when we least expect it, too, so you must expose yourself to as much as possible.

Yes. This can get expensive. (I'm living that right now.)

Yes. You can go to the library. (As I mentioned, I owe them some money, too!)

However, if you never pay for your reading, don't you feel the slightest bit insincere asking someone to pay you for your writing? I know I would.

I know writers love to read. The two go hand in hand. All the writers I meet are voracious readers, so I don't know if the article I read is even still relevant today. But here's a thought: the next time you absolutely love a book you picked up in the library and want to recommend it someone who you know will love it too, go buy it for them! The person you bought it for will love the unexpected gift and you can consider it your little thank you to the author of the great read.

What Was Your First Book Love?

Book Love

Book love is something like romantic love. When we are reading a really good book, burdens seem lighter, cares seem smaller, and commonplaces are suddenly delightful. You become your best optimistic self. Like romantic love, book love fills you with a certain warmth and completeness. The world holds promise. The atmosphere is clearer and brighter, a beckoning wind blows your hair.

But while romantic love can be fleeting, book love can last. (page 7,The Little Guide to Your Well-Read Life)

You've had this feeling, all readers have. It's that book you can't put down, the story that swallows your consciousness whole and sweeps you out of your reality. It doesn't have to be a work of fiction that takes you there and it happens (hopefully) multiple times in a reader's life. There's nothing quite like being in book love... when you have it and reach the end of the tale, you long for more, ever on a quest for the next great love of your reader's soul.

How It Can Happen
 
It is our first true book love that made us readers. For some lucky people they experienced their first book love in their childhood - perhaps being read aloud to or through the pages of one of their very own first picture books. The scholarly books introduced in school helped some students feel book love for the first time, while other students, perhaps in the very same classrooms, first fell for the comic book they hid in between their schoolbook pages. And, of course, large groups of people didn't find their first book love until their formal education was far behind them.

How DID It Happen?
 
Which one are you?

Which book first captured you so completely that you longed to search for more?

I have discovered mine and that has caused me to become increasingly curious about everyone else's! I would like to do a recurring segment on Rivera Runs Through It about first book loves and I'm inviting you to participate. If you remember your first love and want to share your story, please e-mail me at blogwithnv@gmail.com so I can set up an interview with you!

Some Questions to Ponder

Here are just some of my curiosities about your first book love:

• How did you find the book? 
• When/where did you read it? 
• Have you ever re-read it? 
• What do you think first drew you in - the genre? the writing? the art? something else?
• How did you feel about reading before reading this book?
• Do you recommend the book to others?
• How easy/difficult has it been for you to fall in "book love" again since that book?

...other book-related and reading related questions.

I hope to hear from you. I also hope you are having a wonderful New Year so far and that you are in book love right now. If not, put down whatever you are reading, and go find something that wakes your soul.