If you’re like me, you’re very set in your ways about the books you like, and the books you steer clear from.
Despite respecting all authors of this genre, I have never really been into fantasy fiction, Sci-Fi or Horror for that matter, preferring to have my feet firmly planted on this planet. I like my books filled with people not loads of ghouls and Ghosts, and in reference to my last read, demons.
A few years ago, my boyfriend and I challenged one another to read one of the others favourite books. Whilst he set about not reading Jane Eyre, I tacked The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien.
I think it is a children’s book but I found it really difficult to get into and so to help me my Mum and I set about reading it together (aloud). It sounds silly for adults to do this but storytelling is for all, and if you feel disengaged with a book, try reading aloud on your own or to another person, it helps inject a new vitality and life to the story and takes it off the page, quite literally ! Despite reading this book, it was never going to convert me to this genre, and so I went back to what I knew.
I also received a nice copy of H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds and decided why not ? -it’s such a classic and also a short read. I knew it was coveted as the original sci-fi book. I enjoyed hearing an articulation of such futuristic ideas from a historic perspective. It was interesting to hear another eras thoughts about the future, and how that may differ from how we see our technological future today. I began to see that’s what people enjoyed about Sci-fi- it answered those ‘What If ?’ questions about both our existence and that of extra-terrestrial life…
But these are questions that quite frankly never concerned me. I can appreciate that literature and fiction can be a space to answer and explore these questions. If someone uses these as paths to answer these questions who am I not to celebrate that for them !
So recently, veering away from aliens towards demons, I picked up Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman’s joint novel, Good Omens. Not my genre of choice again but I was interested as to how these two great authors managed writing a book together. Also as a fan of David Tenant, I wanted to read the book before I dived into the Amazon Prime series !
The book is told from an interesting and unique premise; Armageddon is coming in just about a week, ‘next Saturday, in fact. Just after tea’, and the antichrist is missing. It is up to sassy demon Crowley and Angel Aziraphale to try and find him and hopefully delay the Rapture. It is well written and quite humorous and takes an almost blasé attitude towards the end of the world. I especially enjoyed the gags about the M25 being the devious work of a demon from hell- how accurate. There are numerous characters and plotlines to keep hold of, just as warning if this is not your thing. Despite this, the book is a fun jaunt into the apocalypse, which otherwise has promised to be quite a horrifying ordeal!
I will never be a complete convert to this type of fiction, but if I’m sitting here claiming to be widely read I will continue dipping my nose into different types of fiction every so often. I urge you to try something different, keep being curious about books and genres you know nothing about, you may surprise yourself, and on this trip you may find your new favourite book !
Finally, how can we as readers say we enjoy reading because it allows us to escape if we are not willing to jump into sometimes magical, sometimes alien worlds?
Saying all this, I received what could be called a Dystopian style sci-fi book for my birthday, so watch out for my thoughts on that soon !
Add comment
Comments