I'm currently reading The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. That book has no bearing on this entry but I just thought you should know. After I finish Pillars, I plan on reading Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore. The first book of Moore's I read was A Dirty Job where an ordinary man may or may not be death. Moore writes like I wish I could. He could be both serious and funny and it mixed nicely. It was also a well-established story with characters you actually cared for. It was the cover that initially grabbed me and the opening chapters suck you in and make you want to read more. I thought that my first novel did a decent job of balancing the humor and drama while still grounding the story in real life but as I look back on it, I'm not so sure I accomplished that but, in all honesty, I don't think my book is all that good.Maybe I'm just being hard on myself. I was rejected dozens of times and went with the first publisher that said "yes" but what keeps me from totally regretting my decision is that my book is available on websites like Amazon and Barnes and Noble. I take some solace in that but it still sucks that I don't get paid for being a published author. I'm hoping that'll change soon. I'm tired of actually working for a living. Of course I am extremely lazy.
I didn't like the ending of Job which is unusual because usually I like endings of books no matter what happens. I like to sometimes leave the ending up to the reader so they can interpret it however they like. The worst book I've ever read always sticks out in my mind. Reclamation by Sarah Zettel has to be the worst book I've ever read. When you read the back cover blurb and actually think about the premise (humans have colonized the galaxy but no history of Earth exists) it sounds pretty good. I got my copy fairly cheap at a library sale and what struck me as odd was that the copy seemed be an editor's copy or something like that because it specifically said on the cover "Not to be sold". I read it and hated it. I even did a book report on how much it sucked. I've been thinking of buying another copy of it and trying it again, just in case.
But right now I am really enjoying Pillars of the Earth and it's not that long until Christmas when I do my annual reading of Art Spiegleman's Maus.I actually read a lot a few months ago but with moving and my job and wanting to spend time with family and such, time for reading and writing have been set on the back burner but I'm hoping I can start getting back into that now that everything has settled down. But right now, off to bed.
