I spent years reading the praises of Elena Ferrante. I remember fantastic reviews of the early books in her Neopalitan series. I remember words like addicting and immersive. I was fully interested. 

And then I saw the cover to the first book in the series. You see, My Brilliant Friends cover reminds me of a really dull 1970’s family drama. To me it indicates a story that is outdated but not currently relevant, characters that will have no depth, and pages of dull prose. The covers for the rest of the series, to me, feel the same. They feel old but not relevant, dusty with little breaks from boredom, like something I would be embarrassed to have to carry in my bag. 

I wound up buying a copy of My Brilliant Friend while I was visiting an indie bookstore in Nashville. I wanted to buy lots of books and one of the booksellers was very persuasive. Luckily this was right before Michigan’s Stay at Home order, and I quickly needed new books to read. 

I was sold by Ferrante’s first page. I tried to get my book club excited about these now realized modern classics. I heard crickets. The cover had the same effect on than them it did on me. 

This isn’t my first experience with unwarranted cover judgement. I’m a huge fan of the Raven Cycle by Maggie Stiefvater. I love everything about the books – except the covers, and some of the titles. Five years ago I found myself doing the exact same thing – begging friends to read amazing books – please ignore the cover. Fortunately then I succeeded. I have a small group of Cabeswater fans who still joke about the less than ideal cover art for such an amazing series. 

Lately I also find myself weary of trends in cover trends in fantasy and historical fiction. Women’s turned backs, backlit buildings with a brightly lit background, the same font over and over. 

I know we aren’t supposed to judge books by their cover but hell, humans are visual creatures. I’ve read absolute shit novels with covers that could hang in museums. There is power in that image. Sometimes that power is enough to get me through a book but not through the first 50 pages. Sometimes I’ll push through, hoping the book lives up to its cover only to find myself angry at my wasted reading time. 

I have also clearly found gems with covers I find less than desirable, sometimes even embarrassing. Clearly I need to get out of my cover judgement comfort zone more often. Luckily with the prevalence of eBooks I find it easier to pick a book just on description alone and not worry about looking at a cover I find unengaging for days at a time. 

How do you feel about covers? Are you as judgey as me or are you happy to read anything no matter how it looks packaged up at your library/bookstore/online retailer?

One of my earliest posts to this blog was about my love of audiobooks. It is a topic I retouch on often. Same with ebooks. Book format over the last several years hasn’t mattered much to me. I find audiobooks are great for listening to while I work, cook, clean, and take long meandering walks in my neighborhood. Learning to love audiobooks gave me a new way to explore my reading, and gave me a way to fit in reading time during time I considered lost, like my morning commute. 

I have a similar relationship to ebooks. I’ve had a kindle for years. I’ve love how easy it is to carry around several books with just a light device. It is amazing I can sync the kindle app on my phone with my physical kindle, so even if I have left my kindle at home I can continue a story. I love that I can read my Paper White in bed with the lights off. I’m not a great sleeper and regularly find myself up around 3am while my boyfriend snores. The low light lets me read without waking him up or leaving the comfort of my pillows and blankets. 

But the last few weeks I have had a hard time getting into any book on my kindle. I’ve started several audiobooks just to let them languish half finished. I began to worry that the lack of focus I had back in march

Except, I’m still reading. I still enjoy falling into a story. I just need it to be with a physical book. 

I’ve spent a significant amount of time this past week talking with my cowokers about how they are balancing the work-from-home life with normal home life. We were not readily able to work from home before our shut down, so everything about the last two months has been new. That includes creating offices out of kitchen tables, dogs as coworkers, and more screen time than ever. 

It seems like now my world is mostly screens. I have nothing but virtual meetings, which are exhausting on a social and physical level. I am in several group chats with friends and family, and have a few friends that I know I need to check in on as they quarantine alone. This means I’m on my phone more often. Plus any music, podcast, or audiobook is accessed through my phone. All of my news comes from push notifications or twitter scrolling. 

Oh, and of course the TV is almost always on in the evenings. In fact the boyfriend and I are watching MASH. We’re watching a lot of MASH. The sole benefit to having so much TV time right now is that we find watching Hawkeye and company is engrossing enough, and late enough in the evening that our phones aren’t buzzing and we don’t feel compelled to check them. 

This is all to say that when I really need to decompress, I need to do it with something that isn’t backlit. I still want to spend time wrapped up in a good book, but I am finding I have to revert back to the early 2000’s, to when ebooks and audiobooks weren’t my main form of book consumption and reading time was sacred, planned, and an escape. 

So I am still reading. In fact I’m reading more than I have in years, but I am doing it almost exclusively with physical books. I can see my own personal library growing and my shelves sinking under the book orders I have made. I may not have a lot of space but I know these books will represent another shift in my reading habits, and will always leave a mark on my library as quarantine reads.

I’ve been fairly lucky. Aside from a weed in early March where I couldn’t focus on anything for more than five minutes my reading habits have never been stronger. I’m sure in the next week I’ll recap my 2 full months of the Michigan Stay at Home order with all of the books I’ve finished. 

I know many people have not been as lucky. Earlier in the pandemic I wrote about the grief I’m experiencing as the world changes. Early days were not great for my coping. 

But now I have more of a routine, my book clubs are meeting more regularly than they did when we all needed to find a day to actually go to someone’s house. I’m doing more buddy reads and speeding through new releases and TBR backlog almost faster than goodreads can log. 

So why do I feel so guilty? As a person with eclectic book tastes I find that while I am reading more, my tastes are a bit…stagenent. Instead of picking up difficult classics or long reads I’m reaching for love stories, YA adventures, and historical fiction that doesn’t challenge my understanding of the world. 

As a rational person with a completely rational brain I know I’m being too hard on myself. The fact that I haven’t used the last eight weeks to finish Don Quixote is not a personal flaw.  I don’t need to be running a 5k every day, cooking all meals from scratch all while keeping up with the news and learning Italian. I don’t. But I feel like I should be doing all of those things, including reading all of the long stodgy books on my TBR. 

But the truth is I’m enjoying love stories. I’m having fun traveling to different countries and experiencing them with fanciful stories. Literary fiction is great but so is the whole enemies to lovers trope. 

Life is about balance. I listened to Beowulf a few weeks ago so now I get to read about vampire  boyfriends and road trips. It is the rules. At least it is my rule.

I’m taking this rule to other parts of my life too. As a rule I try not to snack. We don’t keep a lot of sweets in the house because no one here can see a cookie and not eat it. Chocolate doesn’t last a day. Cake? No way. I love to bake but in general I don’t keep sweets at home. I’m not the cleanest of eaters but I try.

But now I can’t run to a bakery after a bad day at work. I can’t go on an impromptu date to the ice cream parlor. I can’t treat myself with a burger and fries at my favorite bar for completing a goal, or eat my favorite mac and cheese at trivia with my friends. All of the small treats that used to make weeks bearable are gone. 

So are my restrictions for treats at home.

I keep ice cream in the house now. I make banana bread because I want it, not to give it away. I cover popcorn in chocolate and toss in some marshmallows for good measure. I make grilled cheese as a snack instead of a guilty carb filled meal.

I bought oreos. 

And flowers. 

Life is too short and times are uncertain. It should include sweets, tots, and frozen treats. I don’t want to wake up one day to find that I’ve been chasing a smaller pant size while I could have enjoyed a big buttery bowl of popcorn with my boyfriend on movie night. 

So if anyone else is beating themselves up over their lack of serious reading, their snacking habits or really anything else. We’re still grieving. We’re living through a historic event. 

Eat the damn brownie.