There are four small book stacks within four feet of where I sit to slice each morning.
My 2023 reading challenge is to read all of Shakespeare’s plays. I haven’t been keeping up with my reading schedule, but my current play (King John–better than you think it is!) and Marjorie Garber’s doorstopper “tour” through all of Shakespeare’s plays, Shakespeare After All, which I dip into before, during, and after reading a play, are at hand for when I get back to it.
Three books recently purchased to try to cure my reading slump: the second volume of Australian author Helen Garner’s Diary, T. Kingfisher’s Paladin’s Grace, and Rebecca Makkai’s I Have Some Questions for You. The Diary and Paladin’s Grace have already been started and abandoned, but I still have hopes for Makkai’s new novel.
I want to begin reading a few pages in a professional development book each morning, and my latest three purchases are waiting: Gholdy Muhammad’s Unearthing Joy; Ellin Oliver Keene’s The Literacy Studio; and Tucker & Novak’s The Shift to Student-Led.
The last stack of comfort rereads awaits reshelving–another stack of books pulled from my shelves, started and abandoned during this seemingly endless reading slump: E.H. Young’s Miss Mole, Stella Gibbons’s Cold Comfort Farm, Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove.
It would be hard for me to find anywhere to sit in my house where there weren’t at least four book stacks close at hand. Even when I’m not reading consistently, I am surrounded by books.
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Today I borrowed the 4-4-4 format from Tammy at Writer Tammy Evans and added a twist of limiting myself to the books that were nearby. Also, I am constitutionally incapable of holding myself to one minute to write a sentence. I find myself gazing off into space and three minutes have passed by. That’s a good challenge for another day!
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