One-Click Shopping Lockdown (Or Finally Tackling the TBR)

I have a confession for you, dear readers: I buy a lot of books. This was a problem years before I had an e-reader, but with the temptation of daily deals and the ease of one-click shopping at Amazon… well, my to-be-read pile expanded tenfold.

I’m not complaining. I mean. Books. However, sometimes I feel badly because books languish on my Kindle for months and even—gasp—up to a year. This means I buy a whole lot of potentially awesome books and then get distracted by the shiny new release and somehow that digital copy slips lower and lower in the queue.

Not anymore! Well, maybe we shouldn’t go that far. Less so now! In December I traveled a few times, both for work and to see family. This meant airplane reading time, which we all know I relish in. I may be the only business traveler who outside of emergencies will not work on a plane. Those few hours are my reading time and now that you don’t have to turn your Kindle off for take off and landing? Oh, hell yes. I ended up with bonus reading time on these trips, too, because awful weather in Dallas meant my home airport was closed. Cancellations, delays and all those no-fun travel issues were mine. But you know what? I had books, because like a squirrel saving up for winter, I’d stockpiled books.

Instead of hooking up to WiFi and buying something new, I decided this was an opportunity to jump back into the books that had sat on my digital shelves for far too long. I’m ashamed to say I hadn’t read Wither by Lauren DeStefano. I’d bought it ages ago. It was fantastic and creative and fresh. (Yes, I’ve bought more of the Chemical Garden books.) I jumped around from genre to genre this month. On my way back from Santa Fe last week I spotted Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood in my queue. Had I really not started the MaddAddam series? It’s true. I fixed that.

Now, I’m not going to lie to you and say I didn’t download new books and read them. I did. I totally did. Plus, did you see Stacia Kane posted a new Downside Ghosts story over on her blog? I may be trying to work through my TBR backlog, but I’m not crazy. When new and awesome becomes available, I’m still going to glom onto it like the good book addict I am.

I’m tempted to keep this up through the new year. Trying to read one or two books that have been on the pile for too long each month. I’ll never catch up, but maybe I’ll discover a series worthy of binge reading. One can only hope.

Oh, and don’t worry: I’ve been quietly writing something new. It’s a thriller and it keeps making knots in my tummy with twists. Eep!