Sun-Treader

I used to read a lot more novels than I do now, and also a lot more book reviews (and those book reviews seemed to review a lot more fiction than they seem to now, though I can't really be sure about that), and people would even ask me for recommendations on occasion.  That this continued, though at a slower pace, even into college is evidenced by the fact that I recommended Embers to several people sometime in my second year (must have been not long after the winter break, since this review is from December 2001 and I know had a review copy, which I now can't find, so I hope it's just in southern California and not actually lost).  But it seems as though my nonacademic reading, and awareness of what's out there, has been declining steadily since late high school, and now, if someone foolishly asks me to recommend something, I can only advert to the same things I would have recommended a year or more ago.  (Relatedly, I can almost never remember the identity of what I've read as little as a month after I've read it.)

On the other hand, my music listening, internet use, and inability to focus are way, way up.

Comments

[eb]

This is not an uncommon problem, it seems.

[ac]

Tell people to read Javier Marías, right before a New Yorker article comes out saying he's the great neglected genius of our time. That works well.

[ben wolfson]

Can you give me a rough time scale for when that might next be happening?

[Kriston]

You may read Marc Estrin and soon complain that his first two unrecognized novles are equally deserving.