by Katherine Reay, @Katherine_Reay
This is a blog about writing, but to do one’s best writing, I contend one has to be an excellent reader. And now is the time – especially if you live in colder climates – to curl up with a good book and get reading.
Yes, we can and do get inspiration from anywhere. Great story ideas come from family, pets, life, movies, TV shows, memes, even quips, and quotes on social media. But to take those ideas and extend and stretch them to their full potential takes something more – imagination, determination, and persistence. I think those skills develop best from reading books. Books allow us to wrestle with ideas, question them, appropriate them and expand upon them within our imaginations. Movies and other media forms don’t allow for that personal appropriate or that time. It’s an experience to be savored – fireside and hot cocoa optional.
I attempt to read at least a couple books a month and from different genres. This year has been busy and, believe me, I feel my lack of reading…
I have my favorites genres, as I’m sure most of us do. But I try to select readings outside those genres as well. It is that reading that most stretches my thinking in new ways. If you like romance, try a mystery. If you like YA – pick up true crime or legal narrative. Nonfiction reader – I challenge you to pick up fantasy. While you may not like the story – and, yes, you can certainly put down a book without finishing it… I won’t tell – you will learn new ways to construct stories, new ways to reveal the human experience, and new ways to think, learn, grow and especially write.
I hope you enjoy this winter — this “quiet” time as the world outside sleeps under snow – which isn’t the quietest time at all. “It’s the most wonderful time of the year” and also the busiest. Yet, I implore you to take a moment and enjoy a good book. Your writing will thank you.
Have fun and Merry Christmas!
Mary Davies finds safety in her ordered and productive life. Working as an engineer, she genuinely enjoys her job and her colleagues – particularly a certain adorable and intelligent consultant. But something is missing. When Mary’s estranged childhood friend, Isabel Dwyer offers her a two-week stay in a gorgeous manor house in England, she reluctantly agrees in hopes that the holiday will shake up her quiet life in just the right ways.
But Mary gets more than she bargained for when Isabel loses her memory and fully believes she lives in Jane Austen’s Bath. While Isabel rests and delights in the leisure of a Regency lady, attended by other costume-clad guests, Mary uncovers startling truths about their shared past, who Isabel was, who she seems to be, and the man who now stands between them.
Outings are undertaken, misunderstandings play out, and dancing ensues as this company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation, work out their lives and hearts.
Katherine Reay is the national bestselling and award-winning author of Dear Mr. Knightley, Lizzy & Jane, The Bronte Plot, A Portrait of Emily Price, and The Austen Escape. Her next novel, The Printed Letter Bookshop, will release May 2019. All Katherine’s novels are contemporary stories with a bit of classical flair. She has also just signed a contract for a nonfiction work to be published in February 2020. Katherine holds a BA and MS from Northwestern University, graduating Phi Beta Kappa, and is a wife, mother, former marketer, and avid chocolate consumer. After living all across the country and a few stops in Europe, Katherine now happily resides outside Chicago, IL. You can meet her at www.katherinereay.com or on Facebook: KatherineReayBooks, Twitter: @katherine_reay or Instagram: @katherinereay.