I know that many people were struggling to read at the beginning of the lockdown but that wasn’t a problem I had.  All I wanted to do was devour books all day long.  However, as the weeks have gone on I’ve found that my reading rate has slowed down considerably.  I couldn’t really understand it as I was fairly sure that I was spending the same amount of time reading.  Having said that, I have also been keeping myself very busy with other things such as chores outside, painting and crochet – things I never normally make the time to do.

My reading had definitely slowed down though and in the end I decided it must be because of my reading choices – I was steadily reading my way through the Swallows and Amazons series by Arthur Ransome.  I absolutely love these books but I do have to admit that they are very gentle stories and not action packed – they are not the kind of fast-paced book which forces you to keep reading so you know what happens next.  They very much allow you to take your time and luxuriate in them.

It has been wonderful to re-read my way through the series in order (apart from Winter Holiday which I read every Christmas and didn’t want to read again so soon) but I am beginning to feel the need to read something a bit more gripping.  Not that I will stop reading Swallows and Amazons – I will just intersperse them a bit with something else.  My first choice was Ben Aaronovitch’s Lies Sleeping – I bought his latest book just before the lockdown started and I’ve been catching up with the series since then.  I don’t just enjoy the stories themselves – I love how intellectual the Latin and historical references make me feel!