I’m a mood-driven person. I read when I want to (though that’s most of the time), and can’t be persuaded to even touch a book when I’m not. Usually, though, this distaste for books is genre-based. For example, there are plenty of times when I feel that, if I read another vampire book, I may turn into a violent, frenzied bloodsucker myself.
More often than lacking desire to read, though, I suffer from what I call Reading ADD. This is when I cannot settle on any one book. I’ll pick up title after title and lose interest after a chapter or two–if I’m lucky. My mind may be telling me that some fantastic books are slow-starters, or that characters change and evolve over the course of books (usually), and three pages isn’t enough to decide whether or not I like the MC, but my attention span isn’t listening. Thus does my (temporary) DNF pile grow.
Sometimes, when this happens to me, I’ll reread an old favorite. I’ll pick something that I know will capture my interest–after all, it did at least once before. And sometimes that works. Other times…not so much. That’s when I begin to think that I might need to be medicated. The only reliable cure for Reading ADD is time. Eventually–though it’s usually much longer than I’d like it to be–I’ll refocus.
Part of the problem, I know, is trouble identifying what I want to read. Am I in the mood for some steamy contemporary romance? Or maybe I want some light and fluffy YA? Because money is tight, and I have the kind of TBR pile that sometimes gives me nightmares, I no longer allow myself the luxury of buying ebooks. Occasionally, if I’m really desperate, I’ll scour the blogosphere for some recommendations on good, cheap indie titles. It’s rare for those books to have the kind of attention-grab that I need to get back on track.
So. My question is this: Do you guys ever suffer from Reading ADD? And even if you don’t, do you have any suggestions as to how to bounce back from this horrific ailment? What do you do when you run into trouble settling on any one read? Or am I alone in this phenomena? I may be crazy, but I’m willing to bet there’s at least one of you out there who can empathize…
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This happens to me all the time. Part of my problem is that I try to read the books that I’m supposed to read, rather than the ones I *want* to read. When I can’t be satisfied with one of the books in my review pile, I go back to my reader roots and pick one of the hundred other books that have been waiting patiently for me to read them. The last time, it was Halfway to the Grave bye Jeaniene Frost that pulled me out of my slump.
It’s the worst when you have dozens of books and not a single one can capture your interest. Between review copies and a general obsession with acquiring books, I have enough to sustain me (in theory) for a good long while. Sometimes, though, it seems like the only thing I want to read is something I don’t have.
I love finding fantastic “oldies” in my neglected TBR pile. I just wish it happened more often.
Oh my god, that totally happened to me too! Actually, it happened just this summer.
I set a goal to read at least 30 books this summer, but couldn’t bring myself to even read a book for more than 30 pages before I go surfing through blogs again. When that happened I actually stopped reading for a few weeks, and when I started reading again, I am miraculously healed. I think that had to do with me not reading for so long and that made me want to read A LOT, so I’d settle for almost any book. However, since I wasted three weeks not reading at all, my goal was completely crushed. I read 4 books this summer, FOUR, in one and a half month. That’s a new personal low…
Well, that’s my story. I think my case is more of a reading runt than reading ADD, but I usually read multiple books at the same time, so I am probably always a reading ADD person, there is no cure…
I know better than to set goals for myself! As soon as I begin to formulate expectations, something else inside of me begins plotting to thwart them. There’s nothing like a goal to send me off into a Reading ADD tailspin.
However, I think sometimes the answer is to take a break. Then you can come back fresh, having missed it. It’s like anything else. How can you appreciate what you have if you don’t ever experience its absence?
Not so much. But 2 weeks ago, I was so pooped that I couldn’t get more than a chapter read each day. It made the book I was reading feel choppy, so it felt/and did drag on forever. So I chased that book with one I knew could get gobbled up in a few days, so that nasty tasting experience wasn’t left lingering.
Now, the rest of my life is full of ADD disasters. So many things unfinished.
Part of the way that I identify myself as suffering from Reading ADD is when I find I have the inability to recognize if it’s me, or the book that’s just not working. Returning to old favorites is one of the few ways I can make a proper diagnosis.
I don’t even want to talk about real life ADD disasters. *shudders*
I totally suffer from what I call “mood induced reading”! I usually will get on a kick where all I want to read is one certain type of genre–this will go on for a LONG time and then BAM I hit a wall and the thought of opening another book in that genre makes me want to scream. I kind of hit there with Romance about a month ago. Try as I might I just don’t want to read it right now though several of the books look really good. I have learned to go with my moods though or I don’t want to read at all. That is when stuff gets scary for me LOL
ME TOO! My phases are long and can be singularly driven. Previously, I have glommed Historical Romance, Contemporary YA and Historical Fantasy. When I’m in a mood, I can only read according to that mood. Doesn’t matter if the book is the best PNR around if I’m all about the HR atm.
I frequently get sick of romance, but usually that’s because some authors make them thin on all the other important things. They can’t forget plot, characterization and setting! That’s a major no-no!
This does happen to me on a fairly regular basis, for the exact same reasons you listed – I can’t decide what I want to read next. Usually for me the solution is finding a good half-hour block of time, and forcing myself to choose one to spend the whole half hour with. Often, by the time I get to the end of the half hour I’m into it enough that if it’s *still* not holding my attention, it probably never will. But most of the time, I find something interesting that will keep me reading, even if I’m reading at a slower pace than normal because I’m fighting the ADD the whole time.
That’s an interesting suggestion. Usually, I get so frustrated with trying to focus that I give up. I’m going to try pushing myself to focus next time. Maybe that will help me get over the hurdle. Thanks!
This happens to me too, sometimes quite often.
I think it’s because I know I should be reading the egalleys I get but I don’t really want to, or I want to read something else but feel too guilty to actually pick it up!
LOL
That being said, I usually just walk away for a while, watch a movie or a season of a show I like – Say Yes to the Dress, Cupcake Wars or any of Ramsay’s many shows works well for me – and just let my brain unwind for a while.
Doesn’t always work though.
Oh, guilt! It wrecks havoc on my reading like nothing else!
But TV? It’s its own addiction. If I start watching it, I have a hard time going back to reading.
Ugh, YES, I hate it when this happens. I feel so unsettled. E hates it too, because then I whine and mention how I’m feeling unsettled and I don’t know what I want to read and nothing is working and I have a huge reading void in my heart that I need to fill but I don’t know howwwww.
To fix it, I’ll pick up one of my old favorites. Sometimes I read the whole book, sometimes I just flip through and read my favorite parts. Usually that gets me back in the swing of things.
E needs to get some serious sensitivity training. Huge reading voids in our hearts are endemic to book bloggers. He must learn to be more understanding. You can tell him I said so.
Oh, yes, the flipping through to favorite parts. I’m totally doing that tonight. *waltzes off*
He’s very sensitive and nice for about the first thirty thousand times I complain about it, but then he starts to get a little annoyed.
I’m currently suffering from this Reading ADD. I was on a roll last month with my reading, however, not so much this month. Usually, to cure myself, I just force myself to read. Of course, I’m easily distracted when I don’t want to read, so I find it a bit difficult. Another thing I find helps, is when I’m in the mood to read, I write a list of books I want to get to, so when I’m in a slump, I just take a book from that list and try to remember why it was I wanted to read that book. It works about half the time for me (not this time around, but it’ll probably work next time).
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