Sometimes The Book Reads You

In the last three or four years, I had checked out only one book which I subsequently failed to complete. I can't recall what it was called, but it was science fiction and had something to do with monks in space. It was a lengthy, dense read, and I just couldn't deal with it. I had checked it out on some recommendation online that  I now can't remember. With deep regret, I brought it back to the library only partly read.

Since then, I had been doing rather well. I didn't enjoy every single book, but I finished them nonetheless. Each one was a minor point of pride. Each reflected my eagerness to learn and my determination to see things through to the finish. Plenty were not terribly difficult reads, but some were rather more advanced. Unfortunately, I have recently come upon a book whose difficulty level exceeds my enthusiasm for its subject matter once again.

I had read Ernest Hemingway's 'For Whom The Bell Tolls' and gotten rather interested in the Spanish Civil War. I understood Hugh Thomas' book on the subject to be the gold standard, and checked it out- heedless of its length and depth. When, after seventeen chapters, the war had only just barely broken out, it was all I could take. I might have gotten further had I kept the book out as long as possible. I had a plan of returning it only to check it out from another city's library.

It was clear though that my heart was not in it, and life is short. It should be spent only on the books that one enjoys enough to plow through with reckless abandon. My pride is wounded, but I start afresh with another book. This one too is by Hemingway, and I hope that the change, in addition to a greater passion for its contents, will allow me to conquer it and get back on the track of reading books at a high rate. I'm fairly confident that this will be the case.