There is probably no better sign of a disruption in the force than when one's carefully organized order of reading becomes disordered. Those of us for whom reading is an essential and consistent part of daily life know what I mean. We have our stack of books at our bedside; a few more by the reading chair somewhere else in the house; one tucked into the bag you take with you everywhere if you live in a city like Los Angeles and you know that it may be hours and hours before you can get back to the books at home; even something at the kitchen table, to read during solitary meals. We are the people who keep extra glasses in any room in which we are likely to do some reading.

There can also be a ritual in the order of our reading. The choice of which books we slip into at any given time can be dictated by different impulses. Certain authors seem to work better in specific seasons, for some reason. Or the ritual can be more specific: Nothing too exciting for bedtime, for example. For months at one point in life, my bed time ritual was Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography, and I found it such a potent soporific that I never finished it. At the same time, a massive historical novel or a book of philosophy or anything by James Joyce I find inappropriate for early morning reading. We have to be up and moving around before we can attempt something on that scale.

Sometimes around cocktail time I enjoy pouring a drink and mixing music with literature. Listening to Louis Armstrong? I like browsing through Satchmo's New Orleans memoirs. Bix Beiderbek? Maybe something by Wodehouse like, well, "Cocktail Time," to name just one out of ninety some possible titles. I also like reading The Beatles Anthology while listening to The Beatles Anthology.

If it's a dark and stormy night (admittedly infrequent here in light-polluted, perpetually mild Los Angeles) then something nice in the horror line: for years I collected Herbert Van Thal's Pan Books of Horror Stories, which never failed. Or the Weavers' and Brunas' Universal Horrors, their controversial history of the Universal Horror cycles of the 30's and 40's. The list goes ever on...

There are many of our favorite authors who are as much of our daily rituals as eating and drinking. For the true bibliophiles among us, there are times we can forego the eating and drinking and just stick with the books.

And it isn't just reading that is essential to our well-being. For some of us, re-reading loved books and authors is a critical part of our reading regimen therapy. The books we return to for succor in dark times can be our armor in battle. They give us support when we're stumbling; they guide us when we don't know which way to turn. They can remind us of the importance of holding fast to the values that make us human. They can bring order out of chaos. When others try to break us, they make us whole. Books kindle a light that can illuminate shadowy corners in ourselves than we have become too comfortable leaving shrouded in darkness.

I have been in a state like that lately, and sometimes when that happens, I find that the old reliables can fail me. Even life-long friends like Doyle or Irving or Dickens fail to grip. When that happens, there's nothing for it but, like a drowning person, to grasp for the nearest floating object and hope it can support your weight. When that moment happens, you head to the library or the bookshop.

While in my personal Slough of Despond, I had chosen Skylight Books in L.A. for my lifeboat. I went in and started thrashing around. I don't read that many novels these days, so I just submerged myself in recent fiction. By the time I washed up some half an hour later, I was gripping four books: La Farge's "Midnight Ocean", Gaiman's "Norse Mythology" and Steven Jarvis's "Death and Mr Pickwick." A friend whose taste is impeccable suggested Christopher Hitchen's "Hitch 22", so that went into the pile as well.

Jarvis's sweeping, discursive, epic historical novel about the creation of Dicken's "The Pickwick Papers" was the first I cracked and it could not have been a better choice. I am now approaching the end of this 800 page Kraken of a book and have been delighted, amused, intrigued, fascinated or horrified every step of the way. Any bibliophile, Dicken's addict, 19th Century freak, pre-Victorian social history fan or reader fascinated by the drama of the process of creation and the importance of novel reading, would be well advised to give it a try.

Not just a great book, it opened my head to the possibilities of love and the power of sympathetic imagination. Hitchens seems like the perfect chaser after Jarvis's book, though I'll see what strikes me at the moment. In the meantime, while the disruption in the force continues unabated, now there is light at the end of the tunnel. I just hope it isn't a train.