The Reviews are In... Or Are They?

You’ve had one of those days when you were actually surprised they didn’t fit you for a straitjacket and show you politely into a nice, padded room. Your stress levels have been through the roof, and no amount of alcohol or chocolate could have eased your mind, even though you bravely gave them both a try. At last, you ease yourself into bed. The lights are perfect, the cat’s snuggled next to you, having already attacked the other side of the bed and kneaded the blanket, causing little pulls of thread in your $400 bedspread. But you do your best to ignore it, because he’s purring happily beside you. Now’s the time you need your newest book to help relax you and take you away.
It’s from your favorite new author, so it has to be great because the other three in the series were fantastic. The hype was massive, and you pre-ordered it to make sure you would have it for times like this.
Time to binge read.
As you finally delve into the pages, you get rapidly drawn into the imaginary world created by the writer. Sometimes it can be genuinely addictive, and you binge read a book in a day or less. Other times it takes you longer, savoring each page, but either way, you end up finishing it.
And once you’ve reached “The End”, you start asking yourself “How was it?”, “Did I enjoy myself?”, “Will I reread this book and buy another from this author?” All the same sort of questions you’d ask yourself after seeing a movie, or going on a hot date. Unlike that hot date, however, you don’t have to wait for a call. A book isn’t something you have to wait for, unless it’s the next in a series.
You’ll know after you’re done reading it whether you liked it or not, and a book doesn’t make you wait for your phone to ring or chime on a text, worry if your breath was bad, if you wore the right clothes, and whether you laughed at all the moronic jokes that were thrown at you over pizza. (I didn’t need to put that in there, but there are more than a few similarities. They don’t call characters “book boyfriends” for nothing).
Anyway, what I was getting to was how you think about the book once you’ve finished it.
Sometimes we can get so wrapped up in the story we never want it to end. Every single feature was amazing, and we can see and hear their voices speaking as we read the words. A grand Oscar-worthy movie played out in the mind. Books like this make us hunger for more.
This is how people can easily end up getting hooked on a writer and setting their accounts to auto-buy. Especially when it comes to series, because those damn cliffhangers always leave you dying to know if she will marry the man she loves, or whether that idiot who paid her father was going to force her to marry him – the one with the nasty, beady eyes, flatulence issues, and an annoying snort laugh. You are convinced she belongs with the hero, a man who is blessed with rippling muscles and the cutest dimples on either side of his… well, I’ll leave that to your imagination.
The bottom line? You loved it.

Read the entire article in the May 2023 issue of InD'Tale magazine.

You can just click on the magazine image on the left hand side of our home page to open and enjoy!

OR

If you would like to receive the magazine every month (for FREE!) , just sign up on our home page. Once you do, an e-mail validation notice will be sent directly to you. Just open and click the link and you're in - forever!  Each month the magazine will be delivered directly to your inbox to downlad and read!