Ed Lynskey's Blog: Cracked Rearview Mirror - Posts Tagged "reading-habits"

I was trying to remember the last time I was totally immersed in reading a book. I mean I zoned out from everything around me, and I just flew through the pages. That's got to be the reader's ultimate high. The last time like that for me escapes my memory as I write this weblog. Has it been that long ago?

Specific reads at specific junctures in life come to mind. Walker Percy's The Movie Goer wrapped me up in its evocative prose one year in college when I read it. Earlier, like many, I got a big charge from Jack Kerouac's On the Road. Maybe our youth is what makes our reading experiences more vivid and alive.

For some reason, vacations make readings more intense. One summer we stayed in Bermuda, and I took along Pat Conroy's Beach Music to occupy me while hanging out. And boy did it ever. I'm not sure I've ever read anything else by the same author since then. It was just the right time and place.

Harry Crews' A Feast of Snakes knocked off my socks in graduate school. I've not read Feast since then. Would it (it's just downstairs here on the bookshelf) have the same impact on me today on a re-read? Well, I'm not sure I want to find out if it does. I sort of like keeping my good memories of the experience.

Back then, Peter Mass' Serpico also stirred my passions. The honest Frank Serpico was also a cool cat. I lent out my paperback and then never saw it again. How many times have you done that? Would he appeal as much to me today? Again, I'll just let my rosy memories be.

I'm sure every time I pick up a new book and begin reading it, my deepest hope is to enter that all-too-rare zone of sheer joy over taking in the words. Nothing else can beat it.

Ed Lynskey
@edlynskey
Author of Lake Charles and Quiet Anchorage

Leaving aside the bible and other religious texts, which book have you re-read the most times? Do you remember how many times you've read it? Has it gotten better with each read? I guess for me The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald would probably take first prize. No doubt its being on required book lists for the literature classes I've taken accounts for why I've read Gatsby so many times. I did read it a couple of years ago just for kicks. Do I intend to read it ever again? Probably not. In crime fiction, I'd like to re-read Chandler's early books as well as Ross Macdonald's best Lew Archers. I'd also lump in James M. Cain and Jim Thompson's best noirs. My 88th book read this year just got logged in, so I'm making some headway.

Happy reading to you and yours!

By Ed Lynskey
Twitter: @edlynskey
Author of Lake Charles
"Definitely recommend you take a fictional journey to Lake Charles."
Elizabeth A. White's Musings of an All Purpose Monkey