Theoretically, I love this idea. I'm a bit obsessive, and I love to read and watch intelligent TV. But so far I have not been able to binge anything. (Well, peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, but that's different.)
In fact, I'm kind of the opposite of a binger. If I find a new author I like, I start picking up the books she or he has written (see Louise Penny example above). But I spread them out. I read maybe one every six months, or even one a year. I love, more than I can describe, knowing that I have a good, solid, reliable book that I know I will like sitting on the shelf or waiting on my kindle.
So I've read the first two Inspector Gamache novels, but the next two are on my kindle, deliciously ready when I am. I've read the first three Mary Russell novels, and O, Jerusalem is waiting for me. I've read two Kate Atkinson novels, and have three sitting on the shelf.
It's like people who stockpile food and water in case of an apocalypse. If everything in my life comes crashing down, at least I know I've got stacks of good books to read.
There is another side to this, though. Several times in the past, when I discovered a new author I liked, if I read a bunch of their books in a row I got tired of them and never went back. Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum novels are a great example. I loved, loved, loved the first four of those books-- they're not great literature, but they're a lot of fun to read. Then I read five, six, and seven, and suddenly I was sick of them and I haven't read another one since (what is she up to now, nineteen?).
I think if I had spread them out, maybe read one every six months instead of all at once, I would have kept going. I got tired of the Joe, Ranger, Joe, Ranger, Joe, Ranger schtick, and my understanding is that a dozen books later, she's still stringing that out. They're all bestsellers, so it must just be me.
This week I'm reading my first Anne Lamott book in ten years. It's an old one, Plan B, published in 2005. It is exactly, exactly the book I needed this week. But she has such a distinctive voice, and already I can tell I'm going to need to take a break for awhile before I read another one of hers.
And TV binge watching-- for some reason, I just can't do it. A couple of times over the past few years, I've set up the DVR to record a series recommended by friends. The episodes pile up and pile up, and I never watch them. I had over a hundred episodes of How I Met Your Mother recorded a while back, and I didn't watch a single one. I finally deleted them because I needed the space for something else. I guess it's just not my thing.
What about you?
And just because, here is your Anne Lamott quote of the day, about aging:
Look, my feet hurt some mornings, and my body is less forgiving when I exercise more than I am used to. But I love my life more, and me more. I'm so much juicier. And as that old saying goes, it's not that I think less of myself, but that I think of myself less often. And that feels like heaven to me. --Anne Lamott, Plan B
3 comments:
It wasn't until after I wrote this that I realized that I have binge read certain authors. I spent a summer reading Georgette Heyer back in 2011, and the following summer I read a bunch of Nora Roberts (although not nearly all of them). And I've already told you about binge reading Betty Neels a couple of years ago. But I've just recently been able to read Heyer again, and I still can't read Nora Roberts. I've tried several of her recently published novels and couldn't finish a single one. I still do read Betty Neels occasionally if I'm in need of something to put me to sleep, but for the most part, her books are dead to me, as they say. I can hardly stand to pick one up. So, yeah, there is no real rhyme or reason to my reading habits.
Not a binger, at all. I like to savor most discoveries, and I would not enjoy watching shows back-to-back-to-back-to-back. We finished GODLESS (whew!), which is a 7 episode series in about 2 weeks, which was as gluttonous as I can tolerate. I think the only author I've binge-read is Armistead Maupin. When I first discovered TALES OF THE CITY, he was about to release the 5th book? I read them all as fast as I could, and couldn't wait for more. Side note, I think I bought one of them when we visited you in NC---at that great bookstore THE REGULATOR. Read those books on the ferry deck headed to the Outer Banks. Good times!
I guess I do binge although not the entirely obsessively watch all the episodes in three days kind of binge. I'll read an author's books - series, not stand-alone - one after the other. I'll watch a netflix show one episode every day or almost every day. I couldn't do it with books that would be too much the same - Nora Roberts, for instance. I like her books because I know what I'm getting, but more than a couple at a time, if that, would be too much. I like long continuing stories, being one of those odd people who loved those enormous 19th century novels like Middlemarch.
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