Tag: writer’s life

Craft Advice, Life, the Universe, and Everything, Publishing Miscellanea, Writing Craft

Four Tips to Break a Reading Slump

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A standard piece of publishing industry advice is that you need to read voraciously in any genres you plan to work in, or already do work in. If I had a dollar for each time I’ve heard this, I wouldn’t be precisely rich, but I’d certainly have enough ready cash to take my family out for a very nice dinner.

This is a maxim that used to make me feel like a failure as both a reader and a writer.

Why? Because for the past eight years, I’ve been in the mother of all reading slumps. It started not when I had kids, but at the time that I started juggling working as an author with having kids. Parenting is a singularly all-consuming endeavor. Writing for publication, likewise. And they both involve a LOT of reading. Reading Goodnight Moon fourteen times in a row (or in our family’s case, an infamous storybook called DW’s Guide to Preschool). Reading your own novels fourteen times in a row, your sense of enthusiasm for them withering into disdain with each successive pass (I always say that the best part of publishing a book is knowing I never have to read it again).

Like I said. Both parenting and publishing require a lot of reading, but not the sort that exactly sparks joy. More the kind that progressively saps your will to live. So for eight years now, I’ve been in a reading slump so vicious that I was lucky to read four or five books in a year, outside of those roles. Mostly I stuck to magazines with glossy pictures of immaculately-maintained English countryside gardens. That was, for a very long time, the only form of print that didn’t make my brain feel like imploding.

And throughout it all, I felt really bad about the fact that I didn’t read more. I wasn’t current on the big, highly-praised break out titles in my category and genre. I wasn’t even current on books my own author friends wrote. At the end of the day, if I had an hour or two to spare, the last thing in the world I wanted was to pick up another book. I gamed instead, or watched Star Trek, or juicy costume dramas.

I’m here to tell you that if this is where you’re at, there is nothing wrong with you. And you don’t need to feel pressured to undertake an activity that feels so off-putting you’d rather sit and stare at a wall. Sometimes, we’re just not in a reading season of life, even as self-proclaimed bookworms. Sometimes, we’re in a season of life where we have to read so much for reasons beyond our own pleasure that choosing books for fun is out of the question. None of the fun is left. It has all been sucked out of the pages.

But it will come back. And there are some gentle ways you can implement to hasten its return. I know, because this year, I set out to break my reading slump. To a degree, I managed. Here are the steps I undertook to do so.

Log Every Book

If you read to your kids, or for professional development, or in some sort of work capacity, log it. Those are valid reads. They don’t suddenly fail to count because you undertook them for a reason outside of personal pleasure. This year, I hit that magical place where my kids are older enough to follow more complex chapter books, and was able to introduce them to a lot of stories I absolutely adored as a kid. Was I technically reading them for myself? No. But I read them, and I logged every last one. My favorite resource for this is Storygraph, though your logging system can be as simple as a pen and post-it note.

Visit Uncharted Territory

If you are required for any reason to read in a particular category or genre, do not, and I repeat, do NOT, try to force yourself to read within it for pleasure as well. My sainted Oma Bergmann was fond of saying that a change is as good as a rest, and as usual, she was right. This year, I managed to maintain interest in books I was reading just for me by staying completely outside of YA as a category, and speculative fiction as a genre. I read a couple of adult novels (women’s fiction). But mostly I read nonfiction. I’ve always loved a well-crafted nonfic, and diving down rabbit holes related to whatever my passion of the moment happens to be is one of my defining traits. Right now, I’m super interested in creating an enriching and rewarding home education experience for my kids, so I read a lot of books on that topic.

Try think outside the box when attempting to find reading material that suits. Foray into nonfiction, poetry, romance, mystery novels–whatever might actually get you excited about a book when that enthusiasm has waned.

Don’t Be Afraid to DNF

For those who aren’t familiar with the term, in book circles, DNF means “Did Not Finish”. I am a huge proponent of DNFing with abandon, and have been since before my current reading slump. Unless you are required to complete a book for some reason, life is just too short to slog through something you don’t enjoy! If the first chapter or first few pages don’t seem like your cup of tea, stop, and move to the next thing. The world is full of books–somewhere out there is one you’ll like better. But pay attention to patterns–if you keep DNFing books within a specific genre or category, maybe it’s just not for you right now. Maybe you should shift gears and implement Tip #2.

Having Fun Isn’t Hard When You’ve Got a Library Card

Acquaint or reacquaint yourself with the local library. If you follow the advice laid in Tip #3, you’ll need to. All that DNFing will get expensive if you buy every last thing you read! The library is a booklover’s buffet–there’s tons to choose from, and you can pick whatever looks good for you. But unlike a buffet, it’s free and you can return whatever you don’t like. If, like me, you’re strapped for time and your attention is fragmented while at the library (I go there with the kids, and library trips are primarily structured around their needs as readers), make liberal use of the holds system. Pick out a variety of titles that you think you might enjoy, reserve them via your library’s online system or over the phone, and then simply pick them up at the front desk at your next visit. This process, more than anything else, has facilitated my return to the domain of the written word over the last year.

Hopefully if you’re in a reading slump of your own, some or all of these tips and tricks will be helpful to you. But the most important thing is to be gentle with yourself–there’s no moral virtue implicit in finishing a certain number of books a year, or even in being a reader at all. While many books contain stories of great value, books are patient–they’ll still be waiting when you’re ready for them.

Short Fiction

Nothing Noteworthy

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So I’ve been wanting to do something for all of you. Something above and beyond just goofing around on Twitter, or recommending my books as quarantine reading. I don’t have a whole lot of mental energy at this point, though–between homeschooling the girls and just keeping abreast of the state of the world, I’m pretty tapped out by the end of the day.

But the one thing I always have, and can always dredge up energy and enthusiasm for, even when I’m running on fumes, is writing. It’s my refuge and my solace and a light for me in dark places. I thought about serializing one of the novellas I have underway in my folders, but I’m not sure what my follow through would be like on that. I thought about posting an old manuscript, chapter by chapter, but frankly, that would just be embarrassing.

Instead, I decided I’d share some free short fiction here on lauraeweymouth.com, as I have time and am able to come up with new things or polish old ones. I’ve got a bit of a backlog of short fic at this point–I love to write it, and occasionally submit it, but it never really gets anywhere. Which is alright–I think in a lot of ways, both in long form and short form, the market and I have dissimilar tastes.

But maybe some of what I’m going to post will be to your taste.

The following story is one that’s been with me for a lot of years. I’ve written it over from scratch probably four times now, but the characters and concept and setting remain the same. It’s about the moments of brief connection that change us; about the fundamental importance of reaching out to others; about how we can be our best selves and do good even in the midst of despair, even when the right actions we’re undertaking seem too small to be important. It felt appropriate for this present moment.

I hope you enjoy it, and that it offers you a little glimmer of hope.

I love you all, and wish you health and happiness today and every day after.

Anyway, here’s Wonderwall Nothing Noteworthy. As always, it comes with a content warning for readers who’d like one, which you can view by highlighting the following:

(Nothing Noteworthy comes with a content warning for potential suicide, but I promise you everything turns out alright)

Monochrome Photography of Bridge

Nothing Noteworthy

By Yours Truly

It was like breaking through the surface of clear water and hauling yourself up onto dry land after spending hours of weightlessness. Everything felt muddled and heavy, all at once too loud and too indistinct, too sharp and too soft. As if the world had become a vapor, and you were the only solid thing in it.

Or so Traveler had always thought. He thought it now, breaking through the surface of yet another time and place and waiting for everything around him to learn the trick of being. To grow substance, and meaning, and heft.

Was that right, though? Perhaps it wasn’t the world that needed to become more, each time he Traveled. Perhaps he was the one who needed to become less. His Temporal Therapist would undoubtedly have numerous pithy things to say on that score, but she was elsewhere, or elsewhen, or both, and Traveler wasn’t meant to be thinking of her now. She was the one, after all, who’d told him he needed a holiday. In retrospect, she might have meant a trip to somewhere warm and sunny, but this was all Traveler knew. This constant shifting through space and time.

Everything rippled in front of him, and he began to make out an astonished face. Whoever it was, they were much too close for comfort, and that was no good, he wasn’t meant to materialize in front of people like this. The proximity scans must have glitched, or the technician had overlooked a life sign.

Traveler attempted to say something reassuring, aware that he must appear quite alarming as he wavered in and out of focus. But the words came out all wrong, sounding like nothing so much as whale song. That was the problem with the newer subcutaneous translators—they worked marvels once you got somewhere (somewhen), but they malfunctioned in the in between.

An unbearable weight settled over Traveler, and he let out a sigh, of both relief and resignation. There. Everything would solidify now, and he could stop feeling the seasick elation Travel always brought with it.

The relief lasted only a moment, though, before being replaced by acute embarrassment. Because in front of him, and somewhat above him, stood a young woman. Bewilderment was etched across her face, but notably, none of the shock or horror Traveler had found in Bystanders on the few occasions he’d been involved in a Temporal Incident before.

“Please remain calm,” Traveler said, as he was supposed to. He glanced briefly down at his shoes before resolutely forcing himself to maintain eye contact. Doctor Eileen, she of the Temporal Therapy, had told him he spent too much time looking down and away. Well, he was certainly looking up now. Perhaps too far up, he realized with a dull shock as his surroundings grew less muddled, cohering into a sense of vast space.

They were standing on a bridge, he and his inconvenient Bystander. It was the sort of soaring steel construct favored in the mid-twentieth century. Beneath them was a moody grey harbor and above them, a moody grey sky, and the Bystander wore a moody grey, calf-length dress, the sort that could only be a uniform and that was, in and of itself, rather a timeless thing. The bridge gave him more of the sense of groundedness he looked for than this wide-eyed, unexceptional woman.

“Hello,” Traveler tried again, deviating slightly from the approved script as he grew painfully aware of how this Bystander stood, bare-footed, toeing blank space on the safety rail of the bridge, one hand resting gently on a steel girder for support. Without that broken bird’s wing of a hand, a single gust of the salt breeze might topple her, sending her over into the foaming breakers and cut-tooth rocks below.

“I’m sorry about all this,” Traveler went on. “You’re not supposed to see me, usually. At least you’re not supposed to see me if I’ve done my job well.”

He was rambling. He had a hard time with Bystanders. Well, not just Bystanders, but unexpected circumstances and potential conflict in general. Which was an unfortunate trait in a Traveler. A liability, the Bureau had called his anxiousness; hence the Temporal Therapy.

The woman looked down at him and at his words, recognition sparked in her, replacing the bewilderment.

“No, I know,” she said with a gentle nod. “If I do my job well, you’re not supposed to see me either. I’m meant to be invisible.”

A strong eddy of wind surged over the bridge, and she swayed. Traveler caught his breath.

Carefully, he cautioned himself. Carefully.

“I know it’s upsetting, what you just saw,” he told the Bystander, trying to sound as reassuring as possible as he returned to the script. “It’s the sort of thing that could cause no end of trouble for you. But I can make it so you don’t remember. I’m…I’m supposed to make it so you don’t remember. So if you come down, I’ll sort things out and you’ll be much happier having forgotten all this.”

It was Temporal Protocol, and normally, Traveler believed fiercely in it. But now, for the first time, the words tasted like a lie. And the woman above him, her bare feet gone blue with cold, obviously did not believe him.

“I don’t know what happy is anymore,” she confessed, the words like a waterlogged thing dredged up from the depths of the harbor below.

Traveler faltered. Every Bystander he’d met before jumped at the chance to forget. No one ever wanted the complications remembering an Incident would cause.

“Maybe not happier then?” Traveler offered. “But you’ll go back to the way things were, just a moment ago, before I turned up.”

The woman, standing on the rail of the bridge, suspended above that breakneck drop to the harbor, only looked at him.

Guilt uncurled in Traveler’s stomach. The sort of guilt he wasn’t supposed to feel, because he wasn’t meant to identify with Bystanders—they were only set pieces, after all. Just little chips to move across the vast gameboard of time, to be born and reborn, snuffed out or brought into existence with the wave of a Technician’s hand.

“I’m so sorry,” Traveler whispered, his words nearly eaten up by the wind. He spoke the apology in earnest, not as a matter of habit. He was sick with guilt, and that was more than half his problem. You’ve got to find a way to distance yourself, Doctor Eileen always said. Put up some walls, Traveler, or the stress will kill you. “It’s just, those were the things I’m meant to say. I don’t…I don’t know what else to tell you.”

The Bystander was still looking at him, dark circles like bruises beneath her eyes.

“Tell me something honest,” she said. “Tell me something true.”

And then,

“Please,” she added.

There was a world of longing in the single word. A fathomless yearning for real connection, and Traveler knew it at once because it was the thing that lay at his own center.

“I’m tired,” Traveler told her.

And he was. Tired to exhaustion, tired to despair, tired of the endless succession of wheres and whens, the distance and the separation and the need to never identify, because to do so would be to shatter, and what good was a broken Traveler? It was his job to stay the course, to do what he was told, to rearrange the building blocks of history until they came out as something better, and maybe, possibly, someday, as something perfect.

“I’m tired, too,” the Bystander said softly.

And she was. Tired to exhaustion, tired to despair, tired of the endless succession of days filled with worry and hardly getting by, with working till her head spun and her body cried out but never letting herself really feel any of it, because to stop moving might mean never getting up again. It was her job to say nothing, to do as she was told, to rearrange the inadequacies of her life until somehow the eternal conflict between rent and the need to eat and the desire for even a hint of joy resolved themselves into a happier whole, into the sort of dream worth striving for.

But they never did. They never did, and so here she stood with blank space above her and blank space below, and nothing but this moment between her and an ending.

The Traveler swallowed. Inside him, all the many conflicting voices of Technicians and fellow Travelers and Temporal Therapists were chattering away. For once, he shut them off, and out.

“Come with me,” Traveler said, and held out a hand to the woman above him, with the bruises beneath her eyes and the emptiness beneath her feet.

A siren shrilled somewhere in the city beyond them, its sound a high, wild whine. Far across the water, the rhythmic thrum of a helicopter became audible, and grew closer bit by bit.

“Where will we go?” the woman asked. Traveler shook his head.

“I don’t know.”

“Will we be alright?” she pressed.

Traveler put his free hand into one of the pockets of his long, Temporally-Benign coat. “I don’t know that either. I’m not…I’m not supposed to be speaking to you. Not really. You’re supposed to agree to forget, and then it’s like I’ve never been.”

“I want to remember you,” the woman said, her chin jutting out stubbornly, and Traveler couldn’t breathe. No one had ever wanted to remember him before.

“Come with me,” he offered again.

And then,

“Please,” he added.

There was a world of longing in the single word. A fathomless yearning for real connection, and the Bystander knew it at once because it was the thing that lay at her own center.

Without a word, she reached out, and before the wind could take her, Traveler caught her hand in his own and held it tight. He could not remember the last time he’d felt another person’s touch. She could not remember, either.

“There,” the woman said a little breathlessly as she stepped down onto the firmer ground of the bridge’s walkway. Her socks and shoes were nearby and she bent to pull them back on, a small prosaic detail that the Traveler locked up inside himself, for safekeeping and for further reflection.

When she straightened and looked at him, there was still a lostness in her. Still a sense of groundlessness and despair. But she’d reached out, and that was something.

“What’s next?” she asked Traveler.

He held out a hand again because he wanted that touch, that wordless and indefinable connection, and half-eagerly, she stepped forward, twining her fingers through his own.

“I’m not sure,” Traveler told her honestly. “I’m meant to be on holiday. Do you want to come?”

The woman wrinkled her nose, taking in their less than beautiful surroundings. “On holiday? Here?”

“Mm,” the Traveler said, as they stepped off the bridge and onto solid earth, still hand in hand. “They told me nothing noteworthy happened this year.”