Last night, as John sat at the kitchen table following a great brisket dinner at J&Js house for WeHangsDay finishing up some work, I retreated to bed (this should not surprise anyone) and cuddled up with a book.

Confession.

I have been ‘trying’ to read “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” for, well, far too long.  So long, in fact, that I can’t even remember how long it’s been.  John picked it up for me from a book exchange, and I was so excited to crack open the cover … only to discover that the beginning of the novel was pretty tough going.  My mother and I even spoke about it, and she shared with me that she’d read about someone confessing that they didn’t love “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” as though that was some sort of sacrilege, and ironically, people started to come out of the woodwork and confess the same thing ~ it just hadn’t done it for them.  I was both comforted (whew! I’m not the only person on the planet who just.didn’t.get.it.) but it was also discouraging, as I really wanted to like the book.  (No explanation whatsoever for that wish).

With stubborn determination, I opened it up again ~ I had progressed to page 88.  Not a stellar multiple month showing.  I skimmed through the few pages preceding where my bookmark held my place, to refresh myself with what was going on.  Caught up, I plunged ahead.

The thing is, I don’t have a really good, independantly thought through reason for wanting to read the book so much.  Maybe something in those first few pages of  what amounted to -in my opinion- a bunch of unimportant hooey, made me wonder what could possibly have caught enough people’s attention further into the book to keep reading and turn it into a best-selling sensation (**imagine the next few lines read in a deep, dark melodramatic voice-over-type voice** that will be released as a major motion picture in 2012).  I mean, I’ve made it halfway through Anna Karenina (and then I caved and watched the movie, because whew, reading Anna Karenina is somewhat of a challenge when you’re only about 14).  And there were good parts of that novel.  I’ve read more than one Charles Dickens novel ~ if anyone can get through some dense exposition, it’s me.

And just as my eyes were about to slide closed against my will, and the book was about to fall from my sleep-limp hands, I read the hook.

Mental note (in case you’re interested in reading it now): Page 98.

And the thing is ~ it might still be massively disappointing.  All that “hooey” on pages 1-96ish may never come back around to being important (in which case, my main question is ~ what editor thought, ‘yup yup, let the reader think we’re going in this very dry, boring direction just as  red herring‘ and why does that person still have a job?).

But you know that feeling, when you pick up a book, and begin to read, and you fall into the characters and the world the author has created, and it’s as though nothing else exists except for you and the words, and the rustling of the pages as you speed read through the story?

I love that feeling.  It’s why I love reading.  And there’s really nothing quite like a good book to take you away from all your worries and the stress of the world.

“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” might never make it on my ‘Top Books’ ~ but it’s good enough to have a hook to keep me reading.  And I’m grateful every time I pick up a novel and then feel compelled to keep on reading until I finish.