Learning to Read Again

At some point since my daughter was born, I forgot that I loved to read. I remember that before moving to Sweden, I used to read a lot. In high school and college, I fed my habit by working in bookstores. I'm sorry that I've been neglecting my blog recently, but I've been learning to read again. I've discovered that with the help of a rechargeable LED flashlight, I can read in bed during that time between when my husband gets up and when my daughter gets up. This was the time that I often spent blogging, so I'll have to rethink my schedule a bit.

Last summer, my Danish friend brought along a pile of books for our vacation on the island of Aeroe, Denmark. Among them was the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, and she just raved about what a wonderful book it was. In recent years, it seems like most of my reading has been done on vacations (airplanes in particular). It's also been dominated by books about self-help or parenting. Needless to say, these have not been much fun to read, and with months passing between chapters sometimes, my motivation was minimal.

For our trip to Florida, my Danish friend loaned me The Friendship Test. She said it was light reading, good for the airplane, and since I didn't have any other novel saved up for the occasion, I gave it a try. It was indeed a pleasure to read. I sat by the pool and read. I lay on the beach and read, and somewhere there in the sun, I remembered that I loved to read. When it became clear that I would finish this book before I made it home, I got myself a copy of the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society. This book really was lovely, and I was hooked.

I think part of the reason I stopped reading was because I'd tried so hard to read in Swedish. One would think that it's not that difficult for me these days, after all, I do read the newspaper every day. But somehow that extra effort might have been the straw that broke the camel's back. It would also seem that I haven't liked any of the books I've read in Swedish. It's probably blasphemous to say this, especially when one lives in these parts, but I don't particularly enjoy the Wallander mysteries. I've read several of them, and they're just so frustratingly low-tech. I really want to call in the characters from CSI, NCIS, or Bones, and they'd have it all cleared up in 45 minutes.

Anyway, now craving to feed my new book habit, I discovered that a library near here has a shelf of novels in English. I picked a couple of these, nearly at random, and was a bit disappointed. For Easter, we visited our Danish friends again, and I asked to borrow more books. This time she recommended Water for Elephants, and again, I totally loved it. I won't go into details here, but you can see more with the GoodReads link. Perhaps we have the beginnings of a book club here.

So, anyone read any good books lately? I'd love to hear your recommendations.