-
Your next favorite book
is waiting.
Guest blog by Michelle Richmond
Michelle can be found online at
michellerichmond.com
In the past year, I've visited many book clubs for
The Year of Fog.
One of the things I've learned from this experience is how deeply books live
inside the minds of their readers: once a reader opens a book, the story is
never exactly what the author intended it to be. It takes on a new life, a life
informed by the very unique perspective of each reader. The reader is not simply
a separate being in a chair, holding a book in her hands. The reader is always
part of the story.
My book-loving friend Martin and I have a recurring
conversation that usually starts with, "I'm going on vacation and can't figure
out which book to take." It's an interesting conundrum, and for us book
addicts, a critically important decision that we begin pondering weeks before we
actually leave town.
I suppose it partially depends on the type of vacation on which you're taking
this treasured companion (and by that I'm referring to your book and not your
spouse). If your intent is a relaxing week at the beach, for example, you might
pick something light and fun, perhaps romantic; the latest from
Ann Brashares or
Jude
Devereaux might be your choice. Those seeking to rekindle that special
spark (and this time, I am talking about your spouse) might look for a
steamier option, like
Anne
Rice's Beauty series or something by Jamie Denton (or perhaps no book
at all!). Still others may prefer perusing a longer or more complex book while
on vacation, since it's rare for them to have a large block of time in which to
read.
Guest blog by Meg Waite Clayton, author of
The Wednesday Sisters
Meg can be found online at
megwaiteclayton.com
The history of my writing starts with a brown paper lunch bag. Like Linda does in my novel, The Wednesday Sisters, my first writing teacher dumped a collection of "interesting things" onto a table and told us to write about anything that spilled. She swore we wouldn't have to read. Then she called time after five minutes, and called on me to read first.
Which is the good news: If she hadn't, I'd have ducked out before she could call on me second. It had taken all the nerve I had just to get to that class, to admit that, yes, I dreamed of writing novels. I thought writers leaped tall buildings in single literary bounds, and that's not me.
I recently finished
The Killing Way, a mystery by author Tony Hays. While the book was
relatively well-written, I found that I was still much more drawn to it than its
quality would seem to merit. I kept mentally returning to it, being excited
about getting back to it, only to realize I'd already finished the darned thing
and would have to wait for the sequel. In mulling over why I found this book so
fascinating, I came to the conclusion that it wasn't the plot or the writing
(although both were fine) -- it was the book's hero.
I've had numerous literary crushes over time. My first occurred when I was in
Mrs. Cummins' seventh grade English class. Every year she had her students read
The Adventures of Robin Hood. While most complained, I enjoyed the
experience tremendously. It was my first encounter with the hero, and I was
totally "in love" (whatever that means to a twelve-year-old). I even resorted
to wearing what I thought looked Sherwood-Foresty for awhile (a green shirt that
had laces strung across the v-shaped neckline, and leather moccasins that passed
for "boots," both readily available in the early 1970s, unfortunately).
Guest blog by
Laila Lalami, author of
Secret Son
Laila can be found online at
lailalalami.com
For
the first two years during which I worked on my novel, I didn't have a title for
it. It was simply labeled The Novel, both in my computer and in my
head. Perhaps this was because I really wasn't sure what the book was going to
be about. It started out as a historical novel, following two generations of
two Moroccan families after independence; then I cut out the historical part;
and eventually I got rid of one of the families. As my focus narrowed, my story
became clearer to me. The Novel was about Youssef, a student and movie
lover, who lives in a slum outside Casablanca. He discovers that his entire existence has been a lie--his dead and respectably
poor father turns out to be a wealthy businessman who is very much alive. This
discovery sets him on a journey to find his father and the truth.
There was a time when I used to enjoy having two or three books on the go at a time; but increasingly I'm becoming a one-book-at-time reader. Worse still, from the point of view of my credibility as the editor of an online book magazine, I prefer to wallow in the books I read, rather than speed reading them just for the sake of being able to say that I've read them. For me, books are not trophies to add to my 'have read' list but experiences to absorb. I can read very fast when I have to but it's not an enjoyable experience because, although I come away knowing the plot and able to hold my own in conversation, I have not 'heard' the book in my mind, so I've missed out on the cadence of the author's writing, and the rhythms of the characters and places portrayed.
