The Return of The Native

I’m back! I feel so alive! So rejuvenated! I’ve rekindled the passion I have for reading. I used to read all the time – I read almost every spare moment I had in high school. Then I came to college, and that went out the window, replaced by homework, studying, and surfing the internet. I had very little time to read the large novels that had been my primary fodder, and my shortened attention span wouldn’t allow me to read anything of passing interest. Thus, lacking time and deserving books, I let my personal reading fall by the wayside. Don’t get me wrong – I still read. I reread some of the greatest books I know of: all the Harry Potters, The Sevenwaters Trilogy, The Mists of Avalon, Shakespeare’s Comedies, Jane Eyre, Jane Austen’s novels and short stories, The Outlander Series, and The Witch of Blackbird Pond. I even read some new stories – or tried – Villette, The Once and Future King, and others – I tried to read them, and someday I’ll finish them. But it had been so long since I’d come across a book I just couldn’t put down. Then came my birthday, and I received two new books: The Inheritance, by Louisa May Alcott, and The Dark Mirror by Juliet Marillier. It was as if something just fell into place – I read the inheritance that very night and finished it. Then I began The Dark Mirror, and that too I couldn’t put down. Then I began reading Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte, and I was amazed at how much I loved that book – that too, I couldn’t put down. Then I bought Foxmask, another Juliet Marillier book, and it was torture to put that book down. Monday night, I was almost two-thirds done with it, but I could not for the life of me put it down – I read until three that morning just to finish it. That’s almost two thousand pages that I’ve read since my birthday three weeks ago, and it feels wonderful! I didn’t so much read them as devour them, and I’m eager for more. That thirst, that passion that I had for reading is once again ablaze. And after finishing Foxmask, I felt so alive. The thing is, when I read like that, I am entranced and lost within the creative minds of great authors, such that when I emerge, my creative juices are positively raging to get out. I have to write, I have to draw, I have to sing – anything to release the storm within! And once I calm that tempest, I hope I’ll have another series of books to read to build it back up again! Go read something! I've made a new feature - My Favorite Books for each month - check them out!