Book Withdrawal

The brain shrivels up from lack of fantasy and a world one’s never dreamed of, people and places of wonder.  The fingers itch to graze the imprinted grooves that run along the spine and to gently turn untouched sheets of paper.  The eyes yearn to gaze among individual black symbols, variously strung together to make words, which come alive and leap off the crisp, white parchment, to tell a story.  The ears strain, listening for the unique rustle of pages.  The heart grows cold from lack of joy and sorrow, rage and love, sensationally described in these tales.

The House of Hades book cover.
Image curtesy of Wiki

That is how I portray book withdrawal, what it feels like to not read the books I so desperately want to.

For example, The House of Hades by Rick Riordan is one novel that I have been wanting to read since it came out on October 8.  This book is the fourth installment in one of my favorite series.  I never was into the whole Greek Gods thing until I started reading these books; now I love learning about major gods, minor gods, and old Greek stories.  I don’t know if it’s the subject of mythology, the author’s acumen in writing or a combination of both, but I sure do love the novels.  The sad part about this is that The House of Hades came out on October 8th, here it is November 16, and I’m only halfway through it (I started it a week ago).  To put it simply, I DIDN’T READ THIS AWESOME NEW BOOK UNTIL A WHOLE MONTH AFTER IT CAME OUT!  I guess I’ve just been so busy with school and soccer that I’ve had to put off the free choice reading.  It’s quite sad really, but now that I’m getting into the book, I’m struggling to make time to read now because I don’t want to set it down.

Some of you may be thinking “So what? How is that such a big deal?”  However, the past two years I have gotten the new book in the series near, if not on, the release date, then I proceeded to finishing an approximately five hundred page book within a week.  So yeah, I’m a pretty fast reader when I want to be, but this year, school takes a lot more work.  Don’t get me wrong, I love learning about biology, matrices, new vocabulary, and how to find the theme of a novel, but it can be draining.  My precious, free choice reading has been minimized greatly.  I can only hope that as the year goes on, I can manage and organize my time to fit in more reading.

Now, about the book.  I am really enjoying it so far (no surprise).  There is a lot of action/adventure along with a good amount of humor.  A sprinkle of romance and a bunch of heart-pounding obstacles.  Over the series, it’s awesome to see development in each of the characters.

Find The House of Hades on Amazon and Barnes and Noble