I read a book!

I should begin by pointing out that this is the past tense of the verb ‘to read’. It isn’t an invitation for you to watch or listen to me reading a book. Anyway…

I used to read voraciously, I would get through novels incredibly quickly and enjoyed browsing the rows of books in bookshops looking for my next conquest. I think I’m not alone in saying that as the internet became increasingly accessible and then smartphones appeared on the scene, my book reading slipped. Maybe it was a result of the non-stop bombardment of current events and our desire to look into others’ pretend lives that meant that my choice of books moved towards amateur psychology and self-improvement and (trigger warning) coaching.

Following that descent into discovering that I wasn’t achieving everything at 110% – while still wondering how that would actually work – I chose to read shorter texts, maybe an article from an on-line newspaper or a scrolling/reading mission into the depths of Reddit. And, suddenly, I wasn’t reading books from cover to cover anymore. I would start a new book and get through the first few chapters but then the pressing nature of that day’s global news coerced me into checking what was happening in the on-line world and the book would be discarded.

I recently shared that I had started listening to an album a day. Possibly as a result of breaking out the the algorithm that had imprisoned me to what the streaming service decided I should listen to, I took it upon myself to pick up a book and start reading. It was fortuitous that I started the book about a week before I travelled to see my mum in the UK so I was able to while away the time at airports and on airplanes with my book. Within a week of starting, I’d finished.

I have already almost finished the next book and there are plenty in our home, many of which have been started, but very few of which have been concluded. I’m looking forward to a return to reading as a preferred alternative to watching streaming services (whose algorithm decides what comes next), to reading discussions on Reddit (whose algorithm decides what comes next) or reading news articles without seeing the fnords (something I’d read about in a book – which I’d finished – a long time ago).

You may be wondering what the book was that finally got me back on the path. It was The Satsuma Complex by Bob Mortimer. I’d whole-heartedly recommend it.