Reading for the Novel Challenge has been an interesting experience for me. I’m not sure if I’m the only weird one, but I have this strange guilt complex about reading fiction, despite the fact that I enjoy it immensely. On top of the idiocy of feeling guilty about enjoying something, I’m a writer, and reading fiction is invaluable for my writing, both as inspiration and as some kind of subconscious learning. Yeah. I don’t get the guilt complex either. It’s stupid. Something to do with being an incredibly proactive person — the not-so-great flipside of which is that I’m very bad at relaxing.

Anyway. I’ve got a pretty good excuse to read fiction at the moment and it’s been really wonderful. I’ve spent a couple of Saturday mornings curled up in my favourite armchair, winter sun shining through the window, nose in a book. Sigh. Why don’t I let myself do this more often?

As well as the relaxation factor, I’ve also thoroughly enjoyed starting to pick apart what, exactly, it is that I enjoy (or otherwise) about what I’m reading. I’m getting a bit of extra practise at this at the moment, because I’m tutoring a year 12 student in English, and a lot of what we’re doing is recognising literary techniques and trying to understand what their function is in the text. In our last session we looked at a book I read recently, The Anatomy of Wings, and tried to pull apart a very small section of it, discussing what some of the techniques might be trying to achieve.

I find it very hard not to just point out all the techniques I can see, because I enjoy the process so much (not a great teaching move). I want to do year 12 English again. I think I might be a dork.

In other news, I’m slowly picking up bits and pieces of yoga teaching work as well, and I can’t even begin to describe how much I’m enjoying it. Such a rewarding experience. Hopefully I’ll have a website up soonish that I can share here (and if you’re in Sydney you can come to some of my classes!).

But for now, back to reading fiction — guilt-free!

(PS. Pop by my page and sponsor me — it’s for a good cause.)