I am putting myself on a one week book ban.

Why?

Because I have been spending all of my writing time reading. For science, of course. To study how it’s done.

Okay, because I love to read and it’s so much easier than writing.

Even after the last 2 weeks of daily book reviews, I still have a small backlog of reviews to post. Yeah, I love to read.

And I make myself write a review for most of the books that I read. That is more for the discipline of really looking at the book and figuring out what I like about it and what I don’t. Making myself think through that in hopes that it will improve my writing.

But it’s also easy to get lost in a book. I love stories. I love characters. I love curling up with my iPad and being transported to other worlds.

Fantasy romance is my favorite, followed by science fiction romance, and finally historical romance.

I also struggle with series. I like books that take place in the same world, but I am never thrilled with picking up a book only to learn I need to read the twelve before it to really get it.

I actually have a rule. I won’t pick up a series until the whole series is written. Back when I was a kid, there was a series I was eagerly devouring. The author was amazing . . . and then he died. The series was “finished” by another author, but it wasn’t the same. Really jaded me.

But as I work on my own stories, the first two I’ve written are in the same world. I see how it can be appealing to write a series. However, the stories I’ve written are completely independent. No need to read one to “get” the other.