Miscellaneous

Responding to the comments on the books post

By jeremyblachman

"Why the scarcity of fiction? Is there a particular reason? Care to post about that?"

I don't know why the scarcity of fiction, except that I just find I'm not drawn to most fiction, and when I force myself to pick something up I usually find that I want to very quickly put it down.  There's something about the pace of most fiction, the way most fiction -- even excellent, award-winning, no-doubt-fantastic fiction -- is written seems to put me to sleep.  I get lost.  Maybe it's just that I read too quickly, or that I read for information... I don't really know what the problem is.  To some extent, I think I find that a lot of fiction is just hiding the ball -- I want to read stuff where the writer has something to say, and you get inside his or her head a little bit, and can feel like there's a bit of a connection.  And in a lot of fiction, if any of that is there it's hidden behind layers of characters and plot that I just don't care that much about.  I don't really want to be transported into the fictional life of some other place and time, especially somewhere that the normal rules of this world don't apply.  Except that as I write that sentence, I realize what I'm saying doesn't hold true for television that I'll watch and enjoy, so maybe I'm just inventing explanations to justify.  David Shields has written about this.  He writes:

I think I'll stick with that explanation.  But, anticipating one possible comment: yes, Anonymous Lawyer was fiction.  How can I say I don't generally enjoy fiction when that's what I wrote?  My answer -- and again it may just be my own bizarre explanation of something I just don't understand about why I like to read what I read -- is that I don't think Anonymous Lawyer reads like most fiction, I don't think it has a lot of novel-like qualities to it, and the most interesting pieces of it, whether on the blog or in the book, are where I'm actually commenting and reflecting on things in the real law firm and law school world and not stuck in the (contrived) thread of a plot.  The traditional "fiction" elements of Anonymous Lawyer -- I mean the plot, basically -- is not the most interesting part of the book.  In my opinion.

That answer is too long and says nothing.  I'll try responding to the other comment:

"A post about how you find the time (do you read these books while traveling, etc.) would be really helpful and interesting."

Easier in NY than LA because of the subway.  Far easier.  Airplanes give me lots of reading time.  Being early to meetings, sitting in the waiting room / sitting in my car / sitting in traffic (kidding).  A few nights a week I'll read for a little while before turning off the lights and going to sleep (no TV in my bedroom), especially when there's something I'm excited about reading.  When the writing isn't flowing and I've wasted enough time reading threads on Chowhound or Baseball Think Factory or Television Without Pity, I will force myself to read something real so it doesn't feel like I'm completely wasting my afternoon.  A few pages over breakfast or lunch if there's nothing I'm catching up with on the TiVo.  And occasionally the fact that the library won't let me renew the book any longer, and I really want to read it, will force me to find time.  It helps that I read quickly.

Full post as published by Jeremy Blachman's Brand New Weblog on December 21, 2008 (boomark / email).