I put down a book two days ago. Actually, I dropped it on accident and it landed on the floor, the book mark came out, and I haven't bothered to pick up the book since. I don't know why this is so hard for me to admit to myself and then act upon, but I just can't read high fantasy like I used to when I was a kid. I know this to be true, through and through, and yet I have to periodically reaffirm this assertion which has already been proven. I want to but I can't. I need to get my fix with cheap TV and "B" movies: they serve to hit me up with my dose of guilty pleasure, are just as painful, and are completed in a much much shorter time.
I do not think that my reading hiatus had anything to do with the book I was reading at the time that I went on break; it was merely coincidence that it happened to be fantasy. I was loving every part of the story; I don't think there was anything bad with the book; but something about 500 pages of 700 and three more books to go to finish the story just overwhelmed me to the point of running away despite my good intentions and enjoyment.
I can't do fantasy of this kind, and I'm vowing to never attempt to do so again.
I'm going to read Inkdeath and finish that series at some point in time. Not because I'm a completionist but for whatever reason that series has stuck with me. So long as the narrative doesn't prove too stiff, I'll keep at the Earthsea series. Other than that, I'll have to keep the fantasy novels I read to the contemporary kind: more Lev and Austin Grossman than Tad Williams; not because I feel one writer is better than another rather I just can't do the latter.
Fantasy short stories I can do because they usually have a more pointed and concentrated story to tell than the expansive stuff that makes me cringe.
I'm reading again, and I even seem to be blogging again, but don't expect too much fantasy commentary.
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3 comments:
I've been having more trouble with epic fantasy lately too. Maybe it's not just us. Maybe our expectations have changed, or how they are written is changing.
I'm glad to not be alone. I think it is us. We're too awesome for epic fantasy.
Kinda, but not really. The more we read the more our taste change, grow and develop (or something like that) and epic fantasy has to be the most static genre ever, since ever.
I'm sure there are other factors at play to, but that's all I got for now.
Hello, I could not find your email address listed. I'd like to request a possible review for my novel. Can you contact me at daniel.ionson@gmail.com?
Thanks.
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