I like some more than others. National Hug Day, National Kissing Day, National Orgasm Day, National Leave a Review for Your Favorite Author on Some of Her Books Day...*ahem*...
You get my drift.
If anything should ever be given the royal treatment, it's reading a book. I was a reader long before I was a writer. Thanks to my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Borger, I took my natural affinity for reading and turned it into a passion. I wasn't just reading textbooks at the top of my grade (or higher,) I learned how to read for nothing more than sheer enjoyment. I grew up with these...
... so I understood the importance of reading. I also learned the magic of reading very early on, when I realized all I had to do was crack open a book and I could go anywhere, do anything-be anyone. Imagine a magical pair of shoes where you can step into them and live the life as a whole other person. That's magic! Books are passports, and nothing... I repeat NOTHING... holds more promise than a book in your hands. Yes, I'm old school. I like actual books. I will prowl bookstores for hours. When I was a kid, there was nothing more exciting to me than going down the Scholastic list and picking out which books I wanted to read next.
Like Lays potato chips, man. You can't stop with one. And unlike potato chips, you don't have to. The more you read, the bigger your world gets, and that's a good thing. No. That's a GREAT thing.
So in honor of this fantastic day where reading is rightly celebrated, here are a few special titles that reminded me just how magical finding that perfect book can be.
One question we're always asked as authors is, "What is your favorite book?" I have a bunch I love for various reasons, but if you nail me down to a favorite, there's only one:
THE BLESSING STONE by Barbara Wood is the story of a stone that crashed to earth millions of years ago, and was intercepted by a long line of women at various stages of our history. I can't even get into how much I love historical fiction, it's honestly surprising to me that I don't read more of it. Give me a book where I can get emotionally involved with characters trying to survive the things we only learn about as facts and figures, and I'm a happy girl. It breathes new life into something stale, something that I normally wouldn't care to read otherwise. A book about the Civil War, not so much. NORTH AND SOUTH, with all its human complexity, conflict, sex and drama? Sign me up. Sign me up yesterday. It makes the past come alive for me and makes me feel connected to something so much bigger than my own small life.
Believe it or not, Danielle Steel was the one who originally introduced me to this concept (and she's on this list too, for that very reason,) so I was excited to read this book recommended to me by my best friend (and fellow bibliophile,) Jeff.
THE BLESSING STONE is one of those books that widens perspective, which is a beautiful thing. This stone landed in the hands of women who were pushing the boundaries of what was traditionally accepted of them. It started with the Homo sapian girl on the African plain who, though she couldn't talk or really apply deductive reasoning past their own limited experience/knowledge, understood that the leader of their tribe was dooming them to certain death by not turning away from the distant plumes of an active volcano. In a world where they depended upon tradition, Tall One, as she was known, was being compelled by an entirely new human trait that developed long before civilization, religion or democracy, simply because it had to.
She, instead, was being compelled by intuition. And she had to learn what all of us humans have had to learn. Do we trust that inner inkling that something isn't right, that those constructs we had always trusted and never questioned might actually do us more harm than good? Or do we follow tradition blindly, even if it means heading right off a cliff?
Delicious conflict, no? And that's only the first story of many.
This stone ends up passing through the hands of many diverse and interesting characters who defined our journey, particularly as women, as we shaped the changing world around us, from the ancient world to the 20th Century. This sweeping saga is filled with beautiful, empowering stories that touch upon several key points in history, everything from the time of Jesus to the irresistible call of Manifest Destiny, and as such touch upon the key emotional and practical evolution we've experienced as a unique species upon planet Earth. I love, love, love this book so much I can't believe I've only read it once. Might be time to correct that, and what better day than #NationalReadaBookDay?
If you want a light and easy read, this ain't it. But if you want to read an important, perspective-altering book you'll remember for years after you read it-do yourself a favor and get this book.
As much as I loved reading as a kid and young adult, writing screenplays did a lot to wreck my stamina. I was retrained on the concept of "economics," which bled over into everything else. I process information much differently now, particularly stories. I need to connect the dots quickly and keep moving, so there are a lot of writers I used to read I haven't been able to read for a long, long time (even cherished favorites) because they take a little longer than I can stand "getting there."
Honestly, I thought this would doom me for reading books ever again, especially the big, dense books I used to inhale in one sitting. I still read, but not as much, and it's a lot easier for me to abandon a book rather than see it through to the end. I have shelves of unread books because of this. On one hand I hate this, because like I said before, there's nothing more promising to me than an unread book in my hands. I want to go wherever it leads, and nothing disappoints me more than running out of gas in the first few chapters. It takes a really freaking special book to pull me in and keep me vested from the start.
On the other hand, though, finding that rare and special book is like finding a forgotten hundred-dollar bill in my pocket, which makes the whole experience that much better. Hell, I'd even say it's magical. And that's exactly what happened with WATER FOR ELEPHANTS.
If you haven't read the book or seen the movie, I highly recommend you read the book first. The two are completely different experiences because they had to be, and I really, really want you to experience the book in its most beautiful form. Let the story unfold page after gorgeous page and hook you in, just like it hooked me.
Truthfully I didn't read WATER FOR ELEPHANTS because I was captured by the blurb. It's about circuses, and I could give a rat's ass about that. No, I read this book because it is a NATIONAL NOVEL WRITING MONTH (NaNoWriMo) success story, and that interested me way more.
***MINOR RANT***
If you're not familiar, NaNoWriMo is the much-maligned annual event where optimistic writers the world over attempt to write a 50,000-word novel in just 30 days. It's maligned because for some weird reason, we like to discourage writers from, you know, actually writing. In every other endeavor, the more you do something, the more you're regarded as an expert in your field. In writing, however, we treat authors like they're given one tiny speck of brilliance that they only get one or two shots at harnessing, and even if they DO harness it, we expect them to take years and years to make it marketable.
There are a lot of folks out there, both readers and writers alike, who believe that it takes years to write a book worth reading. I hate this kind of mentality usually, because the writing process is one of those things that differs for each and every writer, and lumping us all together like that is unfair to the point of being offensive. The more you throw a ball at the basket, the more you're going to sink it thanks to the experience and training. Excellence, therefore, isn't some accident. It's the product of lots of hard work to prepare one to be as skilled as they can possibly be. If a talented, seasoned writer can sit down at a computer and bang out a book in a month, we should all get out of the way and let them do it.
I honestly don't know where we came up with this wretched, small-minded idea that all writers need to pull every single word they write from their soul with a dull butter knife, and if, by some miracle, a writer can produce faster or easier than that, it's clearly not any good. Some people just write faster, or are filled with stories they need to tell or it'll drive them insane, so they're driven by their muse like a pack animal to write, write, write before their she takes off again like the flighty bitch is known to do.
Some writers have a couple of books in their soul. Some have a hundred. And it's okay either way.
Brilliance is unpredictable, which means there's no paint-by-number formula or one-size-fits-all way for any one writer to produce any one book. Genius can and does happen in a flash. ROCKY was written in a week. THE BREAKFAST CLUB was written over two days. A CHRISTMAS CAROL, which has given birth to many other incarnations of the story since, was written in six weeks.
Is everything written in such a short time frame fabulous? Of course not. But neither are books that take years to write, either. Time is not the important variable here. Each writer should be given the freedom to manage their Muse however way they see fit. The opinion that matters beyond that belongs to the readers themselves, who pay their hard-earned money for these books, who don't care how it was written as long as the book was good. They realize the quality of any book depends entirely ON. THE. BOOK. If you haven't read it, then you can't assign a value to it based solely on how long it took the author to write it. What a ridiculous, silly standard.
This is why I needed to read WATER FOR ELEPHANTS myself.
***END OF MINOR RANT***
I believe I was traveling when I first started reading the book, either on a bus or on a plane. Given that I'm a captive audience in those situations, that's usually where I start (and likewise abandon) books. I bravely opened the flap on that book and started to read, hoping beyond hope I'd make it past the first chapter.
Boy, did I! Sara Gruen delivered with a prologue that practically punched me right in the face. It plopped me down in the middle of the action where, thanks to her finesse, I *thought* I knew where I was going from then on, and thereby locking me in to her roller coaster immediately just to see if I was right. (In fact, reading this book is what inspired how I wrote GROUPIE, among others.)
Of course, I wasn't right about where we were going from that prologue, and that, my dear readers, is what I loved most about it. As I impatiently crawled through the rest of the chapters to fill in a story that I thought I knew, Ms. Gruen was preparing me steadily and surely so she could yank the rug out from under my feet when I least expected. And it was glorious. I prepared for one thing, she delivered another... something better, something I didn't even know I wanted till we got there. WATER FOR ELEPHANTS singlehandedly restored my passion for reading in one beautiful book. If you haven't read it, stop reading this blog and get thyself to Amazon ASAP. You can read it for free on Kindle Unlimited. And I'm pretty sure you'll thank me for it, even if you don't care for circuses.
Another story that circumvented my expectations was THE FAULT IN OUR STARS, a young adult romance that centers around two kids afflicted with cancer. Yes, it is a heavy topic and yes, you're going to need your hankies for this one. It leveled me, even though I thought I spent the whole book preparing for what I thought would happen. (John Green is as crafty as Sara Gruen, maybe even more so.)
But though it is a heavy, even depressing read, it is also beautiful. The characters are so well crafted and engaging. I wanted to know them. I wanted to spend time with them. And I don't know that there is a more romantic book boyfriend anywhere as Augustus Waters. Just thinking about him makes my heart melt and my eyes water. He was absolute perfection in how he plopped into our heroine's life and made her world better for having done so. He wasn't the bad boy, she was the damaged one. And he healed her, as much as anyone dying of terminal cancer can be healed. You know what? I can't even talk about it. It's beautiful. Go read it. But have tissues handy.
For a lighter read, which I read around the same time as I read TFIOS, pick up THE ROSIE PROJECT. It's a romance too, but it's atypical, which is why I love it. If you are a fan of Sheldon from THE BIG BANG THEORY, you'll love this book. It's funny. It's quirky. It's smart. It's also brave, because it centers on a character that, like Sheldon, can be quite off-putting. Don Tillman is quite open from the start that he has difficulty fitting into polite society because he has difficulty empathizing with others. It also makes his quest to find a female companion a lot more challenging. Since he's getting a little long in the tooth, this learned man decides to approach the whole endeavor logically. He makes a list of all the qualities he'd require in a mate.
Enter chaotic Rosie, who tears that list a new one in the space of a date. He realizes at once that she is NOT the one for him, but decides that he can help her with her own project, instead. In doing so, he learns a lot more about empathy, about relating to another person, about love and desire and how we choose our life partners for real, than he ever expected.
(*There's now a book 2, which I didn't realize... this is great news for #NationalReadaBookDay!!)
Ok, I told you earlier that I love historical fiction. I adored Danielle Steel for years because of the magical way she could combine exciting fictional characters against the dramatic backdrop of factual events. Thanks to her, I was able to board the Titanic, survive the great San Francisco earthquake, endure World Wars I and II, survive and rebound from the stock market crash in '29 and walk in the shoes of nobility and royalty. Danielle's books are lavish. Granted they all follow the same kinds of patterns. Girl has everything, loses everything, gets everything back, loses it again, finds love, loses love and finds it again. These are more than just "romances," though that's where you'll often find them shelved. These are about the lives of these women, who become the focus of the book regardless of the men they love. (Again, I applied that same idea to one of my own books, SOUTHERN ROCKER CHICK, because these are the books that I love to read.)
Of all of these historical sagas, FULL CIRCLE is my favorite. (PALOMINO is my favorite romance, because its plot is mostly contained to one primary relationship. HEARTBEAT comes a very close second to that.) In FULL CIRCLE, however, the story is about four tumultuous decades of one woman's entire life. I fell in love with Tana Roberts almost immediately, because as a young woman she goes through a traumatic experience similar to one I had experienced. And if I was raised in a different era, I can see myself forging a very similar path, where she uses her negative experience to promote positive change. I mean, I do that now, only instead of marching with Dr. Martin Luther King for civil rights, I'm banging the gong for marriage equality.
Still, we were both crafted into fire-breathing feminists who wanted to change things that needed changing, and we weren't afraid to get our hands dirty doing the hard work to make it so. We may have been victimized, but we were strong women determined to make a difference, to conquer our pasts and define our futures.
Needless to say, I identify with Tana in many, many ways, particularly in that her most important relationship is the one she shares with her best friend. In fact, I had planned to live my life in much the same ways she did, by moving across the country and moving in with my buddy, going to law school and changing the world. Everything I thought I wanted to do with my life, I got to do with Tana. So I felt every single emotion right along with her, even when they crushed me. (And they did.)
I read this book once every few years, just because I love it so. It's one of those books that is a part of me. And believe it or not, it took writing this blog to figure out why. FULL CIRCLE works like any portal to an alternate universe should; it allows me to peak on on the other side and see what I might have been doing if my life had worked out according to my original plan. Where else can you get that kind of emotional fulfillment for $7.99? Full circle, indeed.
Speaking of emotional fulfillment, I would be remiss if I didn't include WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS in my list. I mentioned Mrs. Borger before, and she was the one who turned me onto Wilson Rawls in the fourth grade, when she recommended I read SUMMER OF THE MONKEYS. I thoroughly enjoyed the book, which took me deep into the Ozarks for an atypical adventure with a young kid and some escaped monkeys from the circus. When, a year later, my English teacher decided we were all going to read another Rawls classic, WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS, I was all about it. I couldn't wait to get started.
Ah, ignorance truly is bliss.
There are two things you need to know about me if you didn't. One, I love dogs. I love most animals, really, but I truly, really love those who go beyond pet to four-legged friends. Two, I'm a softy. I'm sentimental. I'm emotional. I cry at sad movies. Hell, I cry at sad anything. I cry at happy stuff. I cry all the time.
So it should come as NO surprise to anyone that when we got to the end of this book, I sobbed my fool heart right out. I had to do it covertly because it was fifth grade and, you know, kids are cruel. I just laid my head on my arms on my desk and tried not to weep loud enough for those around me to hear.
It was the first time, ever, that a book had made me cry. What a wonder that was! A book is filled with stories that some author just made up out of nothing. And it made me feel. It made me feel a lot. That is magic, my friends. Pure, unadulterated magic. If you can find that in a book, how can it not land on your list of favorites?
GO READ THIS BOOK. And read give it to your kids to read when you're done. Hell, give it to anyone to read when you're done. It will remind anyone what it's like to be a kid. It'll remind you what it's like to want something really bad, bad enough to make it happen no matter what it takes. And it'll remind you of the purest love you'll ever know, the love between a kid and his dogs, who would risk their lives to keep him safe.
Seriously. I'm crying already. Go get this beautiful, beautiful book.
I have a confession to make. I used to read VC Andrews books like I was popping Pringles out of a can. There's a little embarrassment with this because these books are not literary classics by any stretch. They are brain candy, pure and simple, written mostly for a young adult audience who gets off on lots of angst. These are larger than life stories that take you right to the line of social acceptance and demand you choose a side. I read FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC first, which, if you've read it, is an icky little sojourn into darkness of the worst kind... the kind that perverts innocence and damages kids. Because of this, I stopped reading this series with book 1.
I don't know that I would have read another of her books if it weren't for the bestie handing me the first book of a new series, the Casteel books, which started with HEAVEN, the story of a beautiful girl trapped in the ugliest of places. Heaven Leigh Casteel was raised in a one-room shack in the hills of West Virginia. The struggle was real, y'all. You name it, this girl went through it. This was angst to the nth degree, and I just absolutely fell in love with the whole sordid tale.
My life had been no picnic, but it had nothing on this poor girl. Walking in her shoes gave me much-needed perspective that it could be worse, and I could get through worse. Thanks to my love for this character, who went through hell and back just in book one alone, I embraced the idea of book series that allowed me to continue the story wherever it may lead. I wanted more. I needed more. Some stories just don't end at the last page of one book, and I would never want them to. Because of this, I write series books of my own now. More often than not, I think much larger than one story or one plot. I want to build worlds, the kind that march you right up to the line of what you think you can take, where I can watch what you choose.
(This will be especially true with my newest series, one that will release this fall. But we'll talk more about that later. #DevlinisComing)
In the meantime, you can read the five books in the CASTEEL SERIES and rest assured that I won't take my new series THAT far.
Or maybe I will. Who knows?
I can't close my blog of favorites without talking about the Master, Stephen King. My favorite book of his is actually the first book I read, which I did almost entirely upon accident.
When I was a teen, I used to hang out with another bestie at her house in the country, where we would make cookies from scratch and watch movie after movie that they had taped from cable TV thanks to their new-fangled VCR. (It was 1984, these were indulgences at the time.) They had dozens and dozens of tapes filled to capacity with any movie that tickled their fancy. My friend especially liked horror movies, so I got my first education on such things courtesy of these sleepovers.
I'll set the scene for you. I'd head over to her house on the outskirts of town while it was still daylight. We would listen to music or she'd play the piano for me, which was awesome, since I love art in all its forms. We'd bake cookies, we'd eat pizza. You know, girl stuff. Then, after her mother had gone to bed, we'd go out into the living room to start our movie marathon. She'd set the ambiance by turning off all the lights, and we'd huddle there together next to that console TV in the dark, just the two of us. Since she'd seen a lot of these movies, she'd generally go to sleep first, and I was riveted to the TV in that dark living room, listening to the wind blow through the cracks in the windows, which had been insulated with plastic.
In other words, they breathed.
Another thing you need to know about me: I'm a wuss. Actually, I'm a wuss with an overactive imagination, which is even worse. Needless to say, I didn't make it through a lot of those movies before I woke up my friend and we finally went to bed. One such movie was CHRISTINE, which was based off of a Stephen King novel.
Since I enjoyed what I did see of the movie, I decided to get the book to fill in the rest. I had to know what happened, but in a safe environment, i.e., a book. I was entranced from the very first chapter. I loved the conversational tone of it, like I was sitting right next to these characters as they shared their stories. I loved that it included pop culture references, like rock music and even a nod to the movie GREASE. I tore through that book in a couple of days flat, and from then on I was a SK-devotee. I felt wooed and courted by Mr. King, taken in hand and guided along the path wherever he wanted to go. Instantly I trusted him. I read everything I could get my hands on, even though I wasn't necessarily what you might call a traditional horror/science fiction fan.
My favorite story of his wasn't horror at all. RITA HAYWORTH AND THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION, compiled with other short stories in DIFFERENT SEASONS, knocked my socks off. As you can probably already tell from my list, I like stories best when they circumvent my expectations, and that is what he did masterfully in that story. Even in short format it was one of the best things I ever read.
In fact, I haven't even watched the movie yet, because that's how sacred the story is to me. I want to preserve the vision I created with SK as the author/reader experience. That's a very intimate relationship to my mind, especially when the writer in question cultivates and tends to that relationship like the special gift that it is. SK does that better than most, which is why he HAS to be on any reader's list. In so many important ways, he taught me what it was to be a writer just because he took care of me as his reader, and that's a beautiful thing.
And in honor of all these amazing authors and their incredible stories, and #NationalReadaBookDay itself, I'm offering my entire GROUPIE SAGA on sale through Labor Day. You get four titles GROUPIE, ROCK STAR, MOGUL and VANNI for under $5, so you can catch up on one of my most popular series and my most popular characters.
Everything I learned from all my favorite books I applied in that groundbreaking saga, which helped put me on the map. It may not change your life, but hopefully it'll sprinkle a little fairy dust your way.
No matter what you read, or who you read, I hope you enjoy this amazing, wonderful day within the pages of a book, any book. And feel free to share any recommendations you have! (And don't forget to leave reviews!)
No comments:
Post a Comment