The Year in Books

One of my 'should do"s for 2014 was to improve the quality of my reading choices.

I love to read. All my life I have had my head stuck in a book.

As a child I had a small treasured collection of books including some classics passed down from my Mum and Auntie..... Little Women, What Katy Did, The Railway Children and so on.

But books were expensive to buy so I voraciously read everything in my local library... counting the days till the next Saturday when I could go and choose some more.

As an adult one of life's greatest pleasures has been reading .... although when my children were small it was The Hungry Caterpillar and Frog and Toad, Where's Spot and The Walker Book of Bedtime Tales! As a busy working mum I could only really indulge in mammoth reading sessions on holiday, and I used to love browsing in bookshops and stashing away a collection to take away in our caravan each summer.

Reading kept me calm at numerous hospital appointments in the last few years, and I never went anywhere without a book in my handbag. But, I've sort of slipped into the habit or reading light weight   nonsense ... nothing too taxing or hard hitting. Nothing sad and miserable. Lots of cupcake shops and romance in Paris. You know the sort of thing. Perfectly pleasant stuff!

Now, I have much more time available to enjoy reading but I find I'm still stuck in that place. A friend in work passes on everything she reads to me. .... and I take them home not to hurt her feelings. But as she says "Oh it's just the sort of book that you don't need to use your brain to read it!" She reckons that after a day teaching Year Four that's all she can cope with during term time.

Well, no more!!! I'm ready to start using at least some of some of my brain in 2014.

I've found a sort of on-line book club through Karen at A Quiet Corner, linking with Laura at A Circle of Pine Trees. You are invited to just choose a book each month and do a post about it. I thought I'd give it a go.

Starting as I mean to go on, right now I'm reading The Goldfinch which is a massive book. There's been a lot of hype about this, and the fact it's taken ten years to write. I'm more than half way through so I'll let you know how I get on.

Then out of the blue this week, a colleague in work was talking about a book club she belongs to. Joining a book club has long been on my 'list' of things to do so I've asked if I can join in too, and will be going to my first meeting at the beginning of February. Again it's one book a month, and the choices are already set. There's a few genres on the list that I would never normally select, so it will get me out of my comfort zone!

I'll have to do a lot less faffing around in blog land and get reading!