Slow Reader

By Amy Nicholson

I read slowly. I’m trying to be okay with this. Trying not to compare myself to those around me cranking through their To Be Read (TBR) piles, hitting their Goodreads Reading Challenge goals long before the end of the year. Do you know people like this? Are you one of those people? Drives me crazy! Mostly because I feel left out. I don’t usually have fear of missing out (what they call “FOMO” these days), but I guess as far as books go, I just might. 

Last night I started a new book. It was after 9 pm, I was snuggled up in bed, rain providing some lovely background music. I was ready to read myself to sleep. I examined the pile of second-hand (but, as of yet, unread-by-me) books on my nightstand and chose one I thought I could lose myself in and yet not find so scintillating I had to take notes. No such luck. What did I choose? Dani Shapiro’s Slow Motion. Have you read this? If you have, no spoilers please. I’m only on page 10. And it’s not because I fell asleep. On the contrary. 

I’m not even into chapter one and the epigraph hooks me, gets the gears in my head moving. Then the first line calls me to attention. I’m thinking, Yes! That’s exactly it, Dani! (I figure I can call her by her first name in this imaginary conversation I’m having with her in my head.) We DO have moments that define seasons in our lives. How succinctly you’ve put this. And in the FIRST LINE! You are a genius! But I try not to ruminate too much. I make myself keep reading. 

I follow the story. In order to do so, I must read slowly. Her words are spare. I might miss something if I read too fast. But also, the way she describes things, it’s like she’s reading my mind. So, I talk to her while I’m reading. It’s less a consumption of free-floating words and more of a conversation. Then there are times the images or similes are so beautiful I have to lift my eyes off the page for a minute and just behold them. By page 10, I’m so excited, I have to put the book down and (quietly because hubby is asleep beside me) pick up my notebook and pencil. Although I had been tracking her sentences, there was another line of thought traversing my brain. Ideas I couldn’t let go of, thoughts so totally cool I had to get them solidified in ink lest they vaporize. While I’m scratching these new and wonderful revelations into my notebook, I’m thinking, This. This is why it takes me so long to finish a book.

I could conceivably power through and just read page after page without pausing to admire the author’s exquisite turn of phrase, without jotting down my own connections to the story, keep the conversation one-sided. I could plow through a lot more volumes that way. Volumes of volumes perhaps. But, for me, doing so would flatten the experience. It would be like devouring a curry dish instead of enjoying the complex flavors in each morsel, letting it warm you from the inside out. 

Now that I’ve pondered it, I’m glad I read slowly. Writers put so much work into their words. My pausing every now and again to let their words ignite a fire in me, coax a tear, or inspire me to create my own piece only honors the person on the other side. At least in my book.