Catching Up

          Several months ago, when I began this blogging adventure, I started requesting the current bestselling fiction titles from my local library system.  I have fairly consistently checked the list in the New York Times once a week and added any titles I had not yet read to the library holds.  Well, in the last several weeks, my requests have started rolling in like an avalanche.  I’ve waited four and five months for some of these titles, and, of course, I seem to be waiting shorter amounts of time for things requested more recently.  The result of this is that I have been spending every spare moment reading as fast as I can to keep the library fines to a minimum! 

          All this reading has been wonderful, but I’ve been doing it to the exclusion of any writing.  I find that I miss it.  The thought runs through my little brain at odd moments – in the shower or sitting at a stop light – “I’ve really got to get back to writing.”  My head feels more organized when I write.  (If you’ve read any of my prior posts, you can only wonder at how disorganized my brain usually is!)  And so, here I sit at the desk in the dining room wondering what on earth I should write about today. 

          I took another armload of books back to the library this morning, and only brought one new one home; although, I did download an audiobook off the library website this morning too.  The stack on the “reading material table” in the living room is down to a manageable stack – five “hand” books and one audiobook on MP3 that I’ll load onto my Ipod later this week.  I also have four audiobooks on the Ipod that I haven’t listened to yet. 

          Since my husband and I haven’t been going in to work on our investment property every day (it’s complete and on the market), I spend less time with the ear buds in listening.  I tend to forget to put them in when I’m doing “normal” work around the house and yard in which I live.  I’ll try to remember to do that more often.  The more time I spend reading and listening, the more stuff I’ll have to blog about. 

          I’m currently reading A Dance With Dragons by George R R Martin.  It is book five of seven of his Song of Ice and Fire saga.  I read the first book back in 1998 or 1999 and have been waiting impatiently for each subsequent release.  When I read the first book, A Game of Thrones, the tale was to be a trilogy.  An author’s note in the third book, A Storm of Swords, explained that the story was a bit too long for just three books and had become four. Apparently, four was not quite enough, either.  And at last count the saga was to encompass seven books.  At this time, only five have been published, so only time will tell if seven will be enough.  These are huge books, so it may be a while before I finish this one. 

          I am currently listening to Kill Me If You Can by James Patterson and Marshall Karp.  It is keeping my interest well, unlike some others I’ve tried to listen to recently.  I’ll likely write about it in more detail soon. 

          I also just finished The Silent Girl by Tess Gerritson.  It was one of those returned this morning to the library, and I’ve got to tell you about it.  It has been a few years since I sat up all night to finish a book because it was too good to put down.  I liked it a lot.  It really grabbed my fancy and ran. While it did not make me cry, it did make me laugh out loud and made my heart race and the hair on my arms stand up at times. It is a Rizzoli and Isles story, and I noticed as I read that I could “hear” the voices of Angie Harmon and Sasha Alexander from the TV show in the dialog.  It was kind of freaky, but fun.  I’d recommend this book.  I may even read it again some time!