Colleen Hoover Books Just Do it for Me.

Reinstating the Book a Week Project....hopefully.

I’m officially reinstating the Book of the Week Project.

Last year I spent March-September on a reading roll. I read ATLEAST a book a week during those months and it felt like I had found my love for reading again.

I’ve always been a big reader. Or—maybe it’s more accurate to say I’ve always been a big story carnivore. I devour stories of any kind—not just books. But, books are my favorite form of story.

Books are my aesthetic. Piled high on nearly every surface, overflowing on bookshelves, carried in my purse, handy in my car—I’m surrounded by books and that’s just the way I like it.

I graduated with my masters in May of 2020 and the one thing that got me through the program was knowing that after, I’d be able to read whatever books I want.

You see, while I love books, I can’t read them if I can’t give them my undivided attention. It’s the least they deserve.

After graduating, I moved across the country, started working full time, and found it no easier to pick up a book of my choosing than I did when I was in school.

In March of last year, that changed. I’m not really sure why it changed, but it did. What helped the most is that I stopped telling myself I had to read a certain type of book and instead listened to what I wanted to read.

I really like contemporary stories. I really like all stories, but contemporary stories are the easiest for me to get lost in.

I really WANT to like historical fiction. High fantasy. Classic literature. Science Fiction. And I do like it, but it’s not my easy genre. The genre I can read when I’m impossibly busy at the end of a day and it feels like I’m watching a really good tv show. The genre that feels comforting and effortless to me. That genre for me is contemporary romance, and it’s what helps me stay an avid reader.

Case in point: I’ve been trying all month to force myself to read Outlander. I’m interested in it. I like the story. But it is taking me SO LONG to get through. This is not my easy genre.

The first book I read for my book a week project was ‘Regretting You’ by Colleen Hoover.

It was so easy for me to get lost in that book as it had so many elements I enjoy in other stories. A complex mother and daughter relationship. A rebellious girl getting involved with someone she knows she shouldn’t. A second chance romance.

It did not take me long to finish that book at all.

After reading that first book in March, I allowed myself to let reading be easy. I wasn’t in school anymore. I didn’t have to force myself to read anything and I learned that that was my roadblock when it came to getting back into reading after graduating.

I was doing really well in my book a week project until I hit a slump in September. I had to take an emergency trip to help a family member for three weeks and I just fell out of the rhythm.

I spent so much time kicking myself when I got back home for not being able to easily shift back into my reading routine, but I found myself not really getting invested in a lot of the books I was trying to read.

I needed to find another book like the one I read in March. A book that would not let me put it down until it was done and then after would leave me with the reading bug.

Yesterday, I broke my reading slump.

Colleen Hoover published a new book this week and it’s the first time in months that I’ve been able to dive into a book because I wanted to and not because I felt like I needed to—which is an important thing for this mood reader to feel about anything I do. I have a roadblock when it comes to feeling like I HAVE to do something (it’s an issue, I know).

I put Outlander aside and dived into this book because I just needed something easy. I read it in one sitting.

‘Reminders of Him’ is the story of Kenna—a recent ex-convict who moves to a small town in hopes of connecting with the daughter she gave birth to in prison, and Ledger—the local bar owner and the best friend of the boyfriend of Kenna who died in the car crash that put her in prison.

I’m not sure if this has restarted my book a week project, but I’m hoping it has. It’s definitely left me craving more easy reads, which is always a good sign.

If it has, I’ll try and share my weekly reads with you here and hopefully inspire you all to pick up a book and get lost in a story. It’s the best form of Faraway Nearby there is!

Love from the Faraway Nearby,

Adrienne

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