Explaining My Silence and Reviewing the Month of May

There comes a time when even a hobby suffers from a person's silences and inactivity. Sometimes it becomes pronounced that going back to what we love becomes a tortuous task in itself. I have suffered this, though not to the tortuous end.

This year has been like no other year. It has taken me to the extremes of events. I have lost a job and found one. I have known fear and I have been rescued. It is in my moments of desperation that I realise I could not muster the necessary energy to read as many books as I used to read. I discovered that I am not one of those who could lose themselves and seek solace in books when faced with obstacles. In such situations, my mind takes control over me and does its own thinking, unaided, uncontrolled. It is for this reason that my reading in April was highly affected with only two books. I just could not bring myself to read. It is like a writer suffering from a writer's block.

May in Review

This block entered May. I thought that my acquisition of new books will spark my reading. It did. Briefly. I quickly devoured My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk, and I thought things were going to move on in the right direction, especially after reading Charlotte's Web by E.B. White. But then the interest went downhill. I could not finish Atwood's The Blind Assassin, which I had been reading since April (and still reading). I was also not able to completely reread Golding's Lord of the Flies, which was the Writers Project of Ghana's book of the month.

Consequently, out of the target of 60 books in this calendar year, I have - as of today - read 18 books (adding Golding's), instead of the 25 books I should have read. In order not to put undue pressure on myself and to give me room to prepare for my new job, I have reset my target to 50 books.

Projections

I do not know what June holds for me. I have started reading again, albeit not at the same intensity and rate. But the act of reading daily is enough. I know the spark will come by itself and that I will rediscover this waning passion as events are set right. I am reading Atwood's The Blind Assassin and hope to complete it within a few days. I will also be reading Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky, WPG's book for the month of June. From there, I hope things will take off in a very beautiful direction.

Reviews

Not only has my reading suffered. My book reviews too have. In fact, the number of books I need to review has been increasing slowly. It is my hope that I will be able to clear this backlog and move into normal gear. I love what I do and hope things get better.
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*updated to include Charlotte's Web by E.B. White