What I'm Reading Now

Finishing a book lately has been rough for me. I keep on picking up a title, getting about 50 pages in, setting it down, and not feeling compelled to pick it up again. It's not that there's anything really wrong with the book in question. I'm just in a bit of a reading funk, and from what I've read from others right now, I'm not the only one.

A few reasons for my lack of desire to read much: it's blistering hot outside, where I tend to do most of my relaxing reading; I've been working until 7pm most nights, which means my evenings are dinner and bed, usually; and I've been more interested in working on my puzzle, which is difficult to do while reading. It's difficult for me to read while tired, too - I always fall asleep, no matter how compelling the book. It makes those 7pm nights particularly bad for reading.

What this means is that I'm currently reading quite a lot of books, although I'm not finishing them (yet). These are books that would normally appeal to me, and I expect to finish most of them at some point - maybe some of you have read them and can speak for how wonderful they are, thereby convincing me to keep at them until the end.

Long Lankin by Lindsey Barraclough

Kelly loved this one, and it appealed to me before she loved it, so I'm going to keep at it. So far, I'm having a hard time adjusting to some of the dialect used (British slang). Still, I've read and enjoyed stories with much tougher dialect than that included here (Knife of Never Letting Go, for example), so I know it will just take time.

Diverse Energies edited by Tobias S. Buckell and Joe Monti

This is a collection of SF short stories featuring teen protagonists of color. Most of the stories are dystopian in some way, although at least one of them is just straight science fiction. I decided to pick this one up especially hoping it would break me out of my funk - in 20 pages or so, I can get a beginning, middle, and end, and I haven't invested huge gobs of time. The stories have been hit or miss, as expected. My favorite so far is Malinda Lo's story about a girl hunting for her missing brother in the tunnels below a city where racial purity is mandated by law. It's one of the better-written stories and also makes sense narratively. A couple of the stories have been more disappointing than usual - I feel like they were too disjointed and hard to follow, not just "eh, not my thing."

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman

This book, which features dragons that can assume human shape, royal intrigue, and lots of delicious secrets, has been highly acclaimed by readers I trust, and it's just the type of book I usually love. It's been praised for its originality and its writing, but I haven't been able to make myself move past a few pages.

Erasing Time by CJ Hill

As a teen, I thought it would be the coolest thing ever to be taken out of my own time period and brought to the distant future. To this day, it's still a great tragedy in my mind that I won't be able to see the amazing things the far future will bring. (I love dystopias, but my heart always convinces me to picture a more utopian future.) CJ Hill's Erasing Time does just what I dreamed about as a teen - it brings two girls from our present day into the distant future for a specific purpose. I'm excited about this book's premise, but it hasn't been able to pull me in yet.

Are you in a reading funk? Is there anything in particular you've done to get out of prior funks?