BOOKreMARKS: Reading Burdens

I can hardly wait to finish the books I’m reading. Not because I’m glued to the stories unfolding, but because I’m dragging myself through each chapter in hopes that the next one will be better than the last.

It’s probably just a timing thing—my selections are out of sync with my frame of mind. Or it’s a bad combination of topics. I usually have at least one book that’s so arresting I can hardly take a break from it. Unfortunately, that is not the case with my current selections.

One book credits two editors for its completion, but it could easily have used two more. Plodding through misspellings, extra words, and random punctuation slows my reading and comprehension and accelerates my heartbeat and irritation. I could stop reading the book, but I don’t want to miss any of the charming anecdotes about transspecies friendships buried in it. I’ll trudge on.

Another book started out well, but the middle chapters reverted to backstory. As important as this biographical information may be to the author to convey, I find it nearly irrelevant (and, I’m ashamed to admit, uninteresting to me). I’ll continue reading, though. The final third of the book promises to return to the original topic that hooked me in the first place—living with brain damage.

The one work of fiction I’m reading isn’t really a struggle, but I confess I’m having difficulty remembering who all the characters are of all the subplots. My spirits improved last night when the narrator’s own mother exclaimed, “For heaven’s sake, not another character. There are far too many already, and all these minor ones, what’s the point?”

Thanks for putting it bluntly. I feel better knowing I’m not alone.

[Art by Milton Avery.]