What book are you reading right now?

Daily writing prompt

This question hurts my heart and soul a little bit. Actually it is probably more accurate to say it hurts my eyes.

There is back story to this one. I was in seventh grade. 11 or 12 years old, I think? I don’t really remember. I went to the eye doctor and learned that I needed reading glasses. That was the first step that lead to my current reading situation. Around the time I started college I discovered the concept of reading for fun. That happened at the exact time that I couldn’t afford to spend time reading for fun, but what can you do, right? First it was Anthony Burgess. Next it was a deep dive into horror fiction, first with Clive Barker and then with Stephen King. That turned into a lifelong source of enjoyment.

A few years ago… maybe more than just a few years ago, I learned that I need glasses for seeing distances too. That lead to my first pair of bifocals. Progressive lenses, actually but it’s the same difference. Unfortunately, that first pair of progressives made reading a book a little difficult. My eyes got super tired really fast from all the extra work needed to keep focusing through the right spot on the lens. It doesn’t make reading a book impossible, but it does take a bit of the fun out of it. I’ve gotten one new pair of glasses since then and they did make things a smidge easier, but my eyes still run out of gas much quicker than I would like them to.

When the difficulties started I was commuting to work four days a week, and my commute was (as it still is now) very long. I signed up for Audible and my reading habit turned into an audiobook habit. That kept me going for a long time. Then the pandemic hit and I didn’t have a four day a week commute anymore so Audible became an expense that didn’t seem worth it anymore. Even driving in one day a week didn’t seem worth it. Starting in March we’re going to bump up to two days a week. When that happens I will likely sign up for Audible again and get back into books while I drive.

The end result of all of this is the actual answer to today’s question. I am currently not reading (or listening) to any books. None. I am a little sad to admit it. A little ashamed too. There are still some releases that are worth the effort. One came out this week and another is about to come out. I will add them to my xmas wish list though so I won’t be reading them any time soon. One is Geddy Lee’s memoir, My Effin’ Life. The other is a new Stephen King short story collection. I also have a copy of Roger Daltrey’s autobiography that I started but haven’t finished. I very much want to get back into that. Don’t forget a book about the making of The Godfather that I started last xmas. I want to finish that too.

Reading is a great source of enjoyment for me. I would read a bunch of pop-culture fiction, horror and science fiction and maybe a mystery thrown in, and then I would read a non-fiction book or two, histories or biographies mostly, or the odd piece of actual legitimate literature. The idea being that I would try to read something that could to broaden my brain in between things that were purely entertaining. These days though… nothing. Unfortunately.

So the tl;dr thing here is that I am not currently reading anything and it will be a while before I try to start something new. Sorry about that, folks.