About 4 years ago I started reading for fun. This is something completely out of the ordinary for me. I HATED reading as a kid and rarely ever made it through a full book. It was so boring and I always felt like I was going to fall asleep after just a few paragraphs.
I had to force myself, but I find myself enjoying a good read nowadays. The book that got me started on all this was “When You’re Engulfed in Flames” by David Sedaris. http://youtu.be/QabpFCnVnzk
I’m not sure what’s changed my thoughts on reading or why I don’t fall asleep on the third page anymore, but I’m proud to say that today I finished Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse Five“. It was good and for most people they consider it a short read. But to be honest it wasn’t short for me at all. I’m not the fastest reader out there…at least not when you have to comprehend/remember it. If that’s not the case then I’ve got it down to a book every 30 minutes. Just don’t ask me any questions about it. My favorite line was easily, “if the accident will.” I read it about 15 times and just kept looking at it. Out of context it really makes no sense, but the line before was something like, “maybe we’ll meet again.” I understood what the line was supposed to be, but I didn’t get it. Not one bit. If the accident will what? Why did he say it that way? And then it tagged me. The word “Accident” is treated as an entity. Almost like mother nature. He’s saying if the “will” of the entity “Accident” allows it. It’s just so clever. I don’t how he was able to come up with the things he wrote, but he did a great job at it.
I’ve read three of Vonnegut’s books these past couple year including “Cat’s Cradle” and “Sirens of Titan” which were both awesome. They truly make you look at how the world is and makes you shake your head. Besides the great writing I love how his books are setup. They are broken up not only into paragraphs, but into further smaller sections that make you want to read for a just a few more minutes, ok ok….maybe a just few more minutes and then boom a chapter is done. Any other book and I would be defeated by the length and move on.
I’ve created a goal for myself, using the Everest App, to read a book a month. I also need to set it up to remind me to write this blog daily. Once a month seems slow, but hopefully I’ll get faster. January I read “Start With Why” which had lots of great ideas and thoughts of how to go about communicating, but to be honest you get everything you needed out of his TED Talk (http://youtu.be/u4ZoJKF_VuA). I wasn’t a big fan of his speaking style, but his message is great.
So what’s on the shelf next? I just picked up Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” to see how it goes. This typically wouldn’t be a book for me, but it was a present so why not. As for now, I’m proud to have killed another book. So it goes.