Picky Reader? Guess I am….

I used to think I was an “easy reader,” in that I’d read pretty much anything that interested me…but, no sooner had I written that when I began to doubt my words.

I think I’ve grown rather…picky.

I’ve found that though many of these works might even be quite well-written, I no longer seem to be able to spend the time reading some of it.

Life has gotten so busy, but, perhaps more importantly, it seems as if my attention span has greatly waned to much of the fiction out there. I used to read a lot of fiction in my earlier years, but, as an adult, my tastes appear to have gravitated more toward nonfiction, certainly in no small part because of my research reading. However, over the last couple years, I’ve made a conscious effort to read more fiction. What I’ve found is that there simply isn’t much out there that interests me, even in my once favorite standbys of supernatural (more etherial and psychological than gore) and “the weird” (like Kevin Brockmeier’s The Brief History of the Dead—loved this book!) I read beyond those genres, but those are my favorites.

And some of these works I truncate are quite well-written.

I’ve tried to categorize it, and it might be as simple as “Life is Short—Play Hard,” and that if something loses me, and goes in a direction I simply am not a fan of (drug use is a huge #1 pet peeve of mine; hate that many things seem to gravitate in that direction, and hate the gratuitous over use of sex that cheapens the act itself; I can get past minor uses of both, but don’t like their continuous employment), I’ll give an additional chapter or two, try to keep on reading, and if not able to be re-drawn back into the world—leave it.  There are just too many other books out there to be read, and so many others things that beg my attention than when I was a teenager.

And, in a way, this hurts.

See, I’m a really loyal guy, and if I begin something, that loyalty behooves me to want to finish it.

I mean, if it interested me in the first place to pick it up and start reading it, I used to think, I should at least finish it.

Sigh. That, I’m afraid to say…is no longer the case.

I will continue to check out fiction, and give it my best shot, but I no longer have the inclination to continue reading books just because I bought and started reading them, when—for whatever reason—they’ve lost me or go somewhere I just don’t wanna go.

Life is short, and gets shorter with every moment.

So, to everyone out there trying to get and keep me as a reader, I applaud you for doing something I haven’t yet been able to master on a mass level, and I acknowledge your skills, but I mean you no disrespect when I have to leave your work. Others may love and gobble up your words, but I may not be one of them. Hey, maybe my tastes will again change.

And don’t get me wrong—I know perfectly well turnabout is fair play.

So, picky reader?

Apparently.