Annie’s Bookshelf

Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women White Feminists Forgot (2020) by Mikki Kendall

White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard to Talk to White People About Racism (2018) by Robin DiAngelo

Assata: An Autobiography (1988) by Assata Shakur

Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race (2017) by Reni Eddo Lodge

White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color (2019) by Ruby Hamad

Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine and the Foundations of a Movement (2015) by Angela Davis

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness (2018) by Austin Channing Brown

Misogynoir Transformed: Black Women's Digital Resistance (2021) by Moya Bailey

Stokely Speaks: From Black Power to Pan-Africanism (1971) by Stokely Carmichael aka Kwame Ture

The Assassination of Fred Hampton: How the FBI and Chicago Police Murdered a Black Panther (2009) by Jeffrey Haas

I don't mean this as a snobbish "boohoo fried braincells no attention span wHERe iS T He INTELLIGENCE" sort of question. It's just that I've noticed my own reading decline and decline as the years pass, to the point where I'm now actively avoiding buying new books because I know I won't read them.

I used to read constantly. Stories are my escape. But recently, it feels like I'm so swamped with work and exhaustion, that there's no time to actually sit for an hour or more and get into a book. I'm trying to live, earn money, get exercise, cook and clean, and it feels like by the time I crawl into bed there's no spare second to open a book and no spare focus to actually read it.

On top of that, the last several books I looked forward to and tried to read were immensely disappointing. Either the writing skill was poor or the story felt too fast paced to get any purchase on, or the book was just a bunch of tropes in a trenchcoat with no substance between. Part of me wonders if this is a me problem; I've gotten unlucky with my selections, or my tastes are too niche, or I'm just not giving the book a good enough try. I feel like I'm simultaneously over-saturated with content and also can't find anything that stimulates my brain.

And I haven't been very encouraged by my own publishing journey. I've talked before about my experience of following literary agents online and trying to re-shape my manuscript to be more appealing. It feels like a lot of emphasis is put on fast pacing, keeping the book short but every page "exciting", and really spelling out the plot for the readers. I see viral online videos of readers getting annoyed at books for not having smut, for the enemies not getting to lovers fast enough, for magic systems that don't have encyclopedic explanations for their functions. And again, I'm like, "is it just me? My algorithm? Is this how people interact with stories now? Is this how I interact with stories without even realising it? Is this how people will read my story?"

And don't get me wrong, I love smut and enemies to lovers and all that shit. But something about this feels off. Like all books should be made to order and everyone wants to send them back to the kitchen. And so I'm thinking, is that why I'm unsatisfied with my recent reads, or is something else wrong here? Booktok influencers get caught not reading the books they recommend, instead using AI to write the reviews. Indie authors make videos crying and begging people to try their work - and when an indie author goes viral but isn't very good, they get accused of being a scam artist or a fraud or of not caring about their work. Its all so demanding and punitive and joyless. Everyone wants content all of the time but who is actually reading it.

And I think there's multifaceted issues at play here; I remember reading so fondly and nostalgically, with borderline obsession in every story I read. Now I feel I can't relate to the characters, I can't submerse myself in the world, and honestly I don't find I feel the same magic anymore. Part of it is that I put my early reading on a pedestal and have inflated my memory of the stories, unable to be matched now. The other part I think is the industry and it's need to market a book to the most people which ends up watering down every story to be very similar to each other in order to be more palatable to sales. Not to mention the consumerist culture that spits out things fast paced and fast sells to constantly edge you into spending more money.

I think most fantasy novels or series have young protagonists (I have no interest in reading about teenagers anymore) or if they don't they lean so heavily into serious themes that it ruins my chance of escapism. The other part is on me; I used to daydream and self insert myself in stories but now I can't imagine not bringing my family with me into the world. I can't imagine reimagining myself single and unattached again to visit these worlds and stories, because that wouldn't be me anymore. And who would bring their children or spouses even in their minds into a world fraught with danger which was once tantalizing and is now triggering? Putting myself at risk to then save the day or be saved at the last minute was exciting, putting my loved ones there gives me anxiety. I can't relate to stories anymore, I can't see myself in them.

01.06.25 | Growing up Readers📚

I see so much of little me in the child depicted in this image… to this day I still love to lose myself in used bookstores and among the pages of a good book. My whole childhood in one picture!

📖 “Little Worlds” - G. Collet & S. Chebret