Re-reading binge

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I borrowed the first book in Jack Whyte’s Dream of Eagles cycle from my mum on Sunday. I’ve read the series maybe three times before. The books are long — I believe all are over 600 pages; some significantly more than that — and including all of the companion books, there are nine in total. Nine. Even though I love them, I usually get tired around book five, because it’s a lot of time spent in that world (generations upon generations, in fact).

It’s historical fiction, though often shelved in fantasy, which has always bothered me. Sure, it’s about King Arthur and Camulod, but it’s an historical imagining of the “real” people behind the legend. There’s no magic in it. That’s the point.

It’s Thursday now, and I’m well into the third book, The Eagles’ Brood. It’s the one where the narrator changes from Publius to Merlyn, and it always takes me a bit to get over the fact I won’t be experiencing the world through Publius’s eyes any longer. It’s like when The Doctor re-generates. It takes me a while to give the new one a chance. (You too, Whovians?)

Anyway, I truly love these books. They’re well written and the research is super impressive. For a while after I re-read them, I know a lot about the decline of Rome. I know several of the dates of significant invasions in Britain. I know quite a bit about the military structure of the Roman Legions. I know a smidgen about early Christianity. These are all things I learned on previous readings (and, in part, in World History classes), but they come flooding back, and it’s nice to feel like I’m re-visiting and refreshing my knowledge.

These books are also pretty “R-rated.” Lots of sex; lots of death. Not quite to the level of GoT (because, let’s be honest, George R.R. Martin has set that bar shockingly high), but certainly more than your average novel.

If you enjoy historical fiction or books about war or series’ that go on forever or King Arthur stories or Canadian authors or layered and flawed heroes, I would recommend these books. The Skystone is first. Enjoy!

Nightmares

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Here’s the truth, friends. I have nightmares. Lots. Frequently.

Growing up, it was hellish, but now the typical nightmares (you know the ones: being chased, family and friends dying, falling, embarrassment) are no longer that bad. I mean, they are that bad, but after like 20 years of experiencing them, they don’t have the same impact. Mostly, now, I don’t even wake up from these ones. I ride them out.

Today, however, I’m suffering from a nightmare hangover the likes of which I usually don’t feel unless it is one of those rare, devastating, mind-fuck terrors that JT has to shake me awake from.

Last night’s nightmares are haunting my morning, and I hate how it makes me feel.

***

Nightmares have proved to be permanent, unchangeable, unfixable features of my world (so screw all of you who assure your children that they’ll “grow out of it”). But aside from my sleeping hours, I’ve led a pretty charmed life. Everybody has bad times, but I’ve been lucky enough to always have people to love and support me. I’ve had opportunities. I’ve had successes. On average, I’m happy.

So I’ve rationalized that nightmares balance my psyche. They open up the dark, shadowy corners of my mind. They provide a roiling grey counterpoint to my whimsy.

Nights spent amongst monsters and horrors also help fuel my writing. It’s true. I’ve had stories more creative than my waking mind can manufacture spring from my sleeping one. That’s why, on most days, I can say it’s good to have them. It makes me more interesting. It makes me a better writer.

On other days – days like today – I can’t convince myself that there’s anything beneficial to nightmares, except, perhaps, that they flavor my optimism with bitterness, which is refreshing if not pleasant.

Sweet dreams, readers.

The controversy of dog-earing pages

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There are a lot of things that etiquette dictates we don’t talk about in polite conversation, not because they are distasteful but instead because they’re polarizing and often antagonistic. Religion, politics, unions, and recently, vaccinations all fall into this category.

Between readers, I’ve found almost nothing starts an argument more easily than “to fold or not to fold” (except for a discussion of  Twilight… but I’ll save that for another post). To be clear, I don’t think that dog-earing pages actually equates in significance to any of the big issues that have people protesting and legislating and committing violence. However, if you want to see tempers flare among introverted, mild-mannered booksellers, I dare you to fold your pages in front of them.

I am an unapologetic page folder. That, and a general dislike of cycling, were the two things that most set me apart from my indie bookstore cohorts.

To me, a read book should look as if it was handled. It should tell a story about the reader. If the pages are folded hundreds apart, it was read in hours-long stretches. If the cover is bent or marked, it was shoved into a purse or slept on accidentally when the lateness of the hour won out over the need to keep reading. If the pages are stained, it was too good to put down while eating. If it’s unnaturally fat and wrinkled, it was read on the bank of some body of water by a clumsy reader, or it was accidentally left out in the rain. If there are notes in the margins, it was studied or beloved or both.

I could keep my books pristine by reading indoors, by stopping to eat like a civilized person, by using bookmarks (I get enough as gifts), but reading is not an activity I want to do carefully.

A colleague of mine said it best when he described books as “artifacts of our lives” (shout-out to you, Duncan Stewart). They are not just a medium to receive information or decorations for our house. They are not just commodities.

They are pieces of our time in the world. They are tactile moments of education or escape, revelation or disappointment. They reflect who we were as we experienced reading them. And if that means they get a little dirty, bent, or warped along the way, all the better.

The moral, or Unromantic ever after

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Good readers, is it my responsibility to write a story than embraces my belief (or lack of belief) in something or other? Do I have to agree with my own moral?

I’m working on this story. It’s a love story (don’t judge, okay?),  and it’s got me thinking.

Here’s what I don’t believe:
I don’t believe in love at first sight, soul mates, or happily ever after. Despite my own situation, I don’t think that monogamy is “right,” and I definitely don’t think that marriage is necessary. (And while engagements are something to celebrate, I also don’t think they’re an “achievement.” I would have liked people to show half as much enthusiasm at me finishing either of my degrees as they did at JT and I agreeing to continue in our successful co-habiting while wearing rings.)

Here’s what I do believe:
Relationships, like anything worth winning and worth keeping, require effort, energy, and (borrowing from Moody) constant vigilance. Most of all, I believe they require a choice — a choice you consciously make on a regular basis to be the best partner you can, to create the relationship that’s most healthy and fulfilling for you both (or all, depending on your situation).

But my story is operating on a premise in which I don’t believe – one of the aforementioned. I’m writing it because it makes me feel that soppy hopefulness that love stories should make you feel, but I fear I’m perpetuating a myth that Disney implanted within every child of my generation and which I can point to as a direct cause of the singleness of at least a couple of my friends — the myth of “meant to be.”

If I have convictions, I have a duty, at least to myself, to find a way to make my “unromantic” notions of love into something aspirational. I’ll have to learn to write the kind of love I believe in, even if that means shelving that soppy hopeful feeling for a while.