I’ve been feverishly working my way through my book sale, book swap and other unread books for the past month. I returned everything I had on loan from the library, and notices of holds ready for pick up have gone unanswered. I’ve started to read books on loan from friends once or twice, but they’ve been quickly abandoned for my own growing collection.
I’ve made a little bit of headway, too–The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe; Ghostgirl; Plainsong; A Year in Provence. But that’s got to stop.
As summer slowly draws nearer, I’ve got to reduce my personal reading to the occasional interlude. It’s time to focus on Alabama authors instead.
As if that’s such a trial–this is perhaps my very favorite part of my job. Last year I got to live the dream. I spent weeks in coffee shops, stacks of books surrounding me, as I whittled a list of 60-some prospective titles to the 18 I recommended in the article I wrote. I interviewed a rock star of the Alabama literary world, and my coworkers and I recommended some of our all-time favorite books. I’ve been looking forward to this year’s article ever since.
It’s easier this time, because I’ve been paying attention to new releases through the year. I’ve already settled on probably half the books I’ll include and am still expecting several others to arrive soon. (I’ve even started my list for 2009!)
Yeah, my job’s pretty great. I know. The hardest part of this assignment is that it brings me face to face with the fear that I’ll never write anything so magnificent myself.
Yea, that’s the problem with reading so much. I always think, I could never make words sound as great as they do in these books.
Happy reading!