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Twelve Posts of Christmas (and New Year): One – Favourite Christmasses in Books!

2nd December 2013 By Julianne 4 Comments

Hello and welcome to the first in a series of posts I will be doing to get myself (and hopefully you) in the festive mood. I love Christmas. I’m not religious, but I love the season. I live in the northern hemisphere, so Christmas is a bright glittery spot in the middle of gloomy wet winter, and I try to make the most of it.

NaNoFiMo is over, and I’ve finished the first draft of my novel (more on that in another post), so I’m going to take a little break and read lots of books, to remind myself what good novels feel like to read and help me get in the mood for editing. I’m tempted to make some of those books Christmassy, as tis the season, after all! I’ve ordered Let It Snow for the Bookish Brits December Book Club, and since reading and loving Cold Comfort Farm, I’ve really wanted to read the short story ‘Christmas at Cold Comfort Farm‘, a prequel, too.

So I started to think about my favourite Christmasses in books, and quickly decided that would be the topic of my First Post of Christmas.

When I was a kid I read Little Women several times, and the story begins just before Christmas. I loved reading about how the March girls and Marmee spread Christmas cheer, though they are a bit sickeningly sweet and self-sacrificing. I much preferred reading What Katy Did at School. Katy and her sister Clover are at boarding school and decide not to go home for Christmas at the journey takes three days each way. Instead they receive ‘Christmas boxes’ from their families, full of presents and flowers and delicious-sounding cakes. I used to read this scene over and over again and attempt to recreate it by finding things I owned that were similar to Katy and Clover’s presents, wrapping them up, putting them in a box, and then opening it all again! It’s my favourite part of the entire novel and must be at least partly responsible for my love of recieving parcels in the post!

A more recent read was Rebel Angels, by Libba Bray, which is set in the Victorian era and of course it was the Victorians who lay the foundations of Christmas as we know it – inventing greetings cards and enjoying seasonal parties. I loved the historical detail in this book – the balls and other events, as well as the Christmas shopping! I also loved the Christmas scenes in Adorkable – when Jeane went to stay with the Lee family I almost exploded from the cute overload.

What about you? What are your favourite Christmasses in books? If you don’t celebrate Christmas, how are the festivals you enjoy portrayed in books? Any recommendations? I’d love to know.

Reading in the Afternoon, Blogging in the Evening

7th September 2013 By Julianne Leave a Comment

I’ve been a slow reader for the last couple of years. If I remember rightly, in 2009, the year I finished my MA, I read 91 books. That’s my all-time record. I’ve hit 50 a few times, but that year I read books like it was my job, because it was my job.

My MA is in Creative and Life Writing, and for me, reading and writing are co-dependent. I’ve never been one of those writers who has to put reading on hold when they’re working on a project. Reading helps me to write. There are other things that help me write quickly – green tea, walks, anger, the sudden resurfacing of ordinarily-buried memories. But I have to keep reading too. I can’t go too long without it. I have to fill myself up with words to compensate for those I’m putting out. Writing requires reading, and reading induces writing.

Only, there’s this thing called blogging…Oh, blogging! How I love you! It’s kind of like creative writing, except with almost-instant gratification thanks to comments and retweets. It’s very easy to get carried away with it. To find yourself making schedules and other plans and ignoring the little voice that says ‘Can we PLEASE work on the novel now?’.

So I get up in the morning and do my morning pages and look at my blog schedule and go ‘Oh yes, I must write that before Friday’ and I draft whatever it is and then I go to work. I come home and finish it and post it and then I’m too tired to do anything else so I play Flash games on the internet until it’s time to go to bed. Or if I don’t have work, I fit in some procrastination and some more Flash games instead.

And I don’t read any books, and I don’t write any books.

After deleting a load of old feeds from my RSS reader a few weeks ago I reached Peak Internet. This doesn’t happen very often, but it’s a powerful state to be in. Basically, I’m bored of the internet. I can hardly bear the sight of it anymore. I don’t want to surf Wikipedia or read depressing articles on The Guardian or play Flash games for longer than ten minutes at a time. This has freed up my mind to do some problem-solving.

I need to read so I can write. I prefer not to read under the light of my yellow lightbulb, which is right above my bed so I can’t lie on my back to read without it blinding me. Therefore, I’ve started reading in the afternoons, after I’ve done some writing.

IT’S AMAZING. I still manage to blog, but now I’m forced to be more organised, and to procrastinate less. Excellent.

When do you prefer to read? Mornings? Evenings? Afternoons? Do you get most of your reading done during your journey to work, or do you read more at home in the evenings? I read a lot more during the week than at weekends, when I have more social activities competing for my attention. How about you?

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