What I'm reading...

Last year, I signed up for a website called Goodreads.com.

I did this because Goodreads allows you to keep track of every book you've ever read. For some reason, I had been wondering how many books I've read. In my life, I mean.

I tried to guess. What if I'd read 50 books a year? This means that over the last 40 years or so (I really don't think it's fair to count all of the Golden Books or Nancy Drew Mysteries that I read as a child), I've read maybe 2000 books.

Could this be true?

Over at Goodreads, I was only able to come up with about 400 titles. This was disappointing. I really wanted to have 2000 books on my home page, but I couldn't remember every trashy novel I'd picked up at the grocery store.

I was faithful to Goodreads for a while. I would finish a book and add it to my virtual bookshelves. Still, I couldn't get that number up to even 500.

Finally, I got lazy. I would forget to add a book, and read three or four others, and then forget to add those, until finally I gave up. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. In the end, it turned into another chore that I would put off and feel guilty about. I sure don't need any more things like that in life.

So, let's just say I've read 2000 books and leave it at that.

On the journey to 2000, I have read just about everything. I'm a fiction junkie, but I don't limit myself to one genre. Sometimes, I'm looking for a literary tome. At other times, I'll settle for a great horror story or mystery or crime novel. I'm partial to post-apocalyptic tales (think The Stand), but I've also been obsessed with historical fiction. I overdosed on Queen Elizabeth a few summers ago, and I really don't want to sit through another go-round of Henry and Eleanor. I don't mind vampires (loved The Passage this past summer), but I'm also a big fan of Richard Russo and Wally Lamb, two guys who write about 'normal' life and pierce your heart while doing it. I love Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series, and, along with the rest of the civilized world, I enjoyed Stieg Larsson's books.

As a teenager, I would read Gone With the Wind every summer. I devoured most Agatha Christie titles in middle school and high school. I read War and Peace sitting on the beach, and I remember sneaking over to my friend's house to sit in her laundry room and read Love Story when I was in fifth grade. It seemed racy at the time, and I knew my mother wouldn't approve.

Some books I read earlier in life, like The Sun Also Rises, really stuck with me. I know he's not everyone's cup of tea, but I loved this book so much that I waited my whole college career until, as a Senior, I could write a paper on Hemingway. I tingled with anticipation as I sat at my typewriter, finally able to pound out 20 pages on my writing hero. I think I got an A. In fact, I think I still have the paper somewhere.

So lately? I've read Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, and was not enthralled. His characters were pretty boring, and I really didn't much like them. Just finished a new novel by Julia Glass, whose debut, Three Junes, won the National Book Award, and was just heartbreaking and wonderful. Her latest, The Widower's Tale - not so much.

I'm on to what I hope will be a good ghost story - A Dark Matter by Peter Straub. He knows how to weave a story and keep me guessing until the end. Fall is a spooky time, after all, and there's nothing better than a spooky story to go along with my favorite season.

Oh, and I've never read any of the Twilight books. Just so you know.

Happy Fall. Happy reading.