What I needed to hear
I have been a slow reader for a few years now. It's just life that gets in the way, isn't it. I would sit down with a book, and within 5 minutes I need to go to the bathroom, then notice I hadn't finished doing my dishes, the cat wants to crawl on my tummy. I'm lucky if I'm reading an e-book when the cat comes, there's at least some chance of multitasking. If it's a print edition - no way. And I was struggling, it felt like I was missing out on reading.
But then I thought, I'd give audiobooks a go. I had noticed it was mentioned more and more in the media and socials. And I really wanted to read Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club.
I had tried audiobooks a long time ago and had found that I drift off in my own thoughts and then I can't even remember where I left off. But this time, I guess for a good audiobook two factors have to be good - the story and the narrator. If one is missing, we're back to the drifting off.
The Thursday Murder Club is narrated by Lesley Manville. She is perfect for this book. She embodies the characters so well, giving them all the layers and tones. Instead of drifting off in my thoughts, I find myself listening to the book whilst doing my dishes, and in my head I'm walking with Joyce through a Kent village. Or sitting in a room with Elizabeth, eating cake and drinking tea. It does help, I think, that I also have been to Kent, and I have actually lived for a very short time, but still, in a small English village. I know the situation with the buses and I remember the high street shop settings.
there's moreAs a reader
I am slowly reading a book. I purposefully am reading it bit by bit and stretching it out over multiple days and even weeks by now. The reason for this conscious choice is that this hardcover bound literature makes me feel, remember and notice things that I really and truly need to in this period of my life.
As I keep going through this process (and maybe even progress?), I have realised that I want to start a new tag and series in this blog. About me as a reader and about the books I've encountered. Because sometimes going around and excitedly telling about it to All My Friends seems not only not enough, but also is putting my friends under some strange pressure. I mean, this is probably the whole reason why the bookstagram community exists :D
My life as a reader started fairly early. My own memories of that time are mostly fuzzy and blurry trinkets of random episodes. But one thing I do know for sure, I was taught to read pretty much as soon as my relatives could communicate with me coherently enough. And soon enough, I'd be spending my days in "the cold room" (the room above the not so deep basement) with my head immersed in worlds way beyond my own.
there's more