I think you're right that the key thing about getting over a reading slump is self acceptance.
For some reason, only two authors can get me out of a slump - Agatha Christie and Georgette Heyer. I like both but they aren't my favourite. But something about them just gets me going again
This post really got to me! Every time I'm stuck in the slog of the "reading slump," it feels like all the many, MANY books on my bookshelf look down at me as if to say, "We deserve to be on the self of someone that will actually read us." Then they just guilt me throughout the slump until I finally come out of it. It's great! (read: terrible).
That reminds me: I also read and loved the first chapter of Glorious Exploits and then got distracted by life and other books, and should probably go back and give it a second go.
Donna, this is going to be an old analogy... For my recent reading slump, it's been like an old car that just won't start until you spray starter fluid into the carbonator...I had to find just the right genre of book to make my neurons fire and keep firing. Had to try a bunch of different things to start reading and stay reading. My first spark came with A Man Called Ove, the first book l couldn't put down in a long time. Then I languished for a while until my curiosity was piqued by The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store. And off I went, jumping genres all over the place... What horrendous extortion by your sister with Fourth Wing! Although it doesn't get truly smutty until the last few chapters, which I think was a ploy to get the reader over the finish line with a flagging plot. Wasn't enough to raise expectations for the 2nd installment though. Anyway, good luck!
I have also been in a reading slump this year, although my annual goal is more like 20 books than 100.
Counting kid books in your list is actually endorsed by a librarian friend of mine! Any book is a book, she’ll remind us, and reading to kids is important (and also work). This has not gotten me to start tracking picture books on my Goodreads, because I still judge myself, but it also helps me judge myself less harshly when I remember that really, I have been reading books. And they definitely add up!
I’ve gotten a couple of books in this summer, and things that helped included reminding myself that fluffy novellas in my favorite genre count as reading (and one of my series had a new installment to help with that), and also using a different medium to read. By which I mean when paper novels and my usual phone-based reading app failed to hold me, I used an e-ink device. Switch your own medium as appropriate.
Also being on a plane with no travel companions can help me read sometimes. (Sometimes I just watch a dumb action movie, though. It’s not foolproof.)
I think you're right that the key thing about getting over a reading slump is self acceptance.
For some reason, only two authors can get me out of a slump - Agatha Christie and Georgette Heyer. I like both but they aren't my favourite. But something about them just gets me going again
This post really got to me! Every time I'm stuck in the slog of the "reading slump," it feels like all the many, MANY books on my bookshelf look down at me as if to say, "We deserve to be on the self of someone that will actually read us." Then they just guilt me throughout the slump until I finally come out of it. It's great! (read: terrible).
That reminds me: I also read and loved the first chapter of Glorious Exploits and then got distracted by life and other books, and should probably go back and give it a second go.
Donna, this is going to be an old analogy... For my recent reading slump, it's been like an old car that just won't start until you spray starter fluid into the carbonator...I had to find just the right genre of book to make my neurons fire and keep firing. Had to try a bunch of different things to start reading and stay reading. My first spark came with A Man Called Ove, the first book l couldn't put down in a long time. Then I languished for a while until my curiosity was piqued by The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store. And off I went, jumping genres all over the place... What horrendous extortion by your sister with Fourth Wing! Although it doesn't get truly smutty until the last few chapters, which I think was a ploy to get the reader over the finish line with a flagging plot. Wasn't enough to raise expectations for the 2nd installment though. Anyway, good luck!
I have also been in a reading slump this year, although my annual goal is more like 20 books than 100.
Counting kid books in your list is actually endorsed by a librarian friend of mine! Any book is a book, she’ll remind us, and reading to kids is important (and also work). This has not gotten me to start tracking picture books on my Goodreads, because I still judge myself, but it also helps me judge myself less harshly when I remember that really, I have been reading books. And they definitely add up!
I’ve gotten a couple of books in this summer, and things that helped included reminding myself that fluffy novellas in my favorite genre count as reading (and one of my series had a new installment to help with that), and also using a different medium to read. By which I mean when paper novels and my usual phone-based reading app failed to hold me, I used an e-ink device. Switch your own medium as appropriate.
Also being on a plane with no travel companions can help me read sometimes. (Sometimes I just watch a dumb action movie, though. It’s not foolproof.)