On Falling Back In Love With Reading Again

Hello Lovelies!

When I think about reading, I imagine a young Victoria late at night stuck with her head inside a book, bathed in the light of my bedside table lamp, unable to sleep because I was so engrossed. What a rebel I was. I would get lost in so many books. Spending nights in anticipation of when Mr Darcy would confess his love again to Elizabeth, rooting for Matilda and imagining myself with my very own acceptance letter on my way to Hogwarts. But like most young book worms, especially those living through the mobile phone generation of the never ending scroll, this did not last very long.

I don't remember when, what, why or how but somewhere along the line books became a chore. It wasn't that I wasn't willing to give the time to them, in fact I still kept buying books, falling in love with the idea of them but ending up leaving them on the book shelf untouched. In all honesty a large part of what stopped me reading was feeling like I couldn't get lost in books anymore. Somewhere along the line I had pretty much convinced myself that I was not a book person - a funny thing for a person with shelves stacked full with books. 

In all honesty, a massive part of why I wasn't reading anymore was that I love to multi-task. When I blog for example, I'm often doing two things at once but reading demands your full attention. You can't exactly read and do anything else. Ideally I'd be reading books on my commute but anyone who lives in London will know that attempting to read during rush hour whilst you're squished like a sardine is not exactly an easy feat.

But towards the end of last year I decided to try listening to audiobooks as I often enjoyed listening to the odd podcast every now and then, and I had such fond memories of Harry Potter read by Stephen Fry. This was a total game-changer. I suddenly found myself chewing through books, looking forward to my commute and my lunch break so I could get back to whatever book I was listening to. The world of books had suddenly flung back open like an old friend, and I was absolutely hooked. It was just so easy and effortless.

I'd forgotten how much I loved getting lost in reading, and now it seems so clear to me what I had missed so much without realising it. The only annoying thing is that people can be really elitist about reading, seeing audiobooks as completely different to physical books. But I honestly think that is so stupid. Anything that makes books more accessible can only be a good thing. After all some people really struggle with reading, and some of us are just too busy sometimes to sit down with a book. So why shouldn't it be treated the same? But perhaps that is a whole other topic for another day...

Anyways, if you want to try audiobooks yourself, I would really recommend Audible. You can try it out for free for a month, and then if you like it, it costs £7.99 month which gives you a credit to buy a book each month. The only downside is that Audiobooks can be ridiculously expensive (like seriously way more than your average paper book) so I recommend signing up to their daily deal where you get email updates telling you which book is under £2.99 that day as this really helps if you find yourself listening to more than one book a month. 

If you're interested in what I've been reading, feel free to add me on GoodReads. I love to review virtually everything I read, and am currently trying to challenge myself to 52 books this year. Wish me luck!

Love Vicky x