otherland

One of my goals, though it likely seems a little underwhelming to many, is to read at least two books per month: one fiction, one non-fiction.

Just two?

I’m a slow reader, for a start. I don’t skim. I absorb and re-read, and then usually pause at the end of a chapter to let things sink in.

I have a friend who can read a book in a couple hours. When she puts her nose into the pages I guess she just sinks in and shuts out the world.

I drift.

It also doesn’t help that because of my slow speed I rarely read fluff. I usually sink into books that are as thick as a loaf of bread, and as dense as pound cake. They take longer to read because of that, too.

The first book I’ve finished since starting this site is Otherland: City of Golden Shadow, book one in a four part science fiction series by Tad Williams which was published about twenty-five years ago.

I read the paperbacks a couple years after they came out, having picked them up on one of my frequent lunch-break sojourns to the nearby bookstore. The four books took me the better part of a year to push through back in the early aughts, and while I’m not going to dive into book two for a little while, revisiting part one was an awesome reminder why I have kept these paperbacks on a prominent place on my bookshelf for the last couple decades.