After the reading-slump dumpster fire that was 2025, I came into 2026 vowing I would read more books. Almost 1.5 months in, I am pleased to report my desire to read is actually existent. This is a major accomplishment.
🥳
Books I’ve read so far this year include (in no particular order) Reggie and Delilah’s Year of Falling by Elise Bryant (YA contemporary D&D meets punk rock), Beautiful Villain by Rebecca F. Kenney (adult contemporary romantasy retelling of Great Gatsby with vampires), and Murder from A to Z by V. M. Burns (cozy mystery female sleuth who owns an indie bookstore). As you can see, I have a strictly defined reading style and stick to books with a specific genre and vibe.
🙃
Right, my reading tastes are all over the place and tend to shift wildly depending on what I’m in the mood for.
And then there are times where I start a book thinking “I’m so not in the mood for this” and end up sucked in.
My book club (which sounds very official but is actually just me and two bookish friends) is reading The Bone Doll’s Twin by Lynn Flewelling. To be clear, the fantasy genre has always been my happy place, and for a long time, it was “the more epic the better.” Then, as happens, life got complicated and the world got ridiculous (okay, that last bit didn’t really need to happen, but I digress). Anyway, when this pretty serious-looking high fantasy became my next read, I thought I’d have to forcibly slog my way through it.
A week later, I’m 80% through.
I’d actually been avoiding anything too heavy to read because I thought the world was enough. As it turns out, though, heavy was exactly what I wanted right now. A sense of comradery, perhaps? Like, this book gets me and how I feel. It understands things are far from great and is telling me it’s okay to want change and to keep doing what I can to usher it along. It’s showing me there are many parts to play in making the world you want to see and that those all don’t look the same.
Yes, I realize I’m leaning hard into personifying this book but two things:
First, I’m a word nerd—I love literary devices.
Second, if stories aren’t friends, what are they? The author wrote it so the reader could pick it up, go on a journey with the characters, and emerge different at the other end. That’s, like, the definition of friendship.
(Oh, geez, now “For Good” from Wicked is stuck in my head, and I’m probably gonna cry or something.)
But I’m almost done with this post, so I’ll hold off on the tears.
This week’s lesson is to challenge yourself. Do things that feel difficult. If you don’t quite get there, that’s okay. Take a break. Wait. Try again. Trying is the important part. If at first you don’t succeed, and so on. Today, it might be a book.
And tomorrow?
Well, you tell me when you get there.
👋 Fair travels,
Mary
P.S. A big thanks to Desertrose7 from Pixabay for the image.
P.P.S. All books link to The Storygraph because I love that site and want to introduce it to as many people as possible.