Vellum: A pre-review (not a preview)
So, like, seven or eight years ago I picked up this book, Vellum: The Book of All Hours. This was during the infancy of ebooks, back before iBooks, before Kindle, back when Palm was the platform for ebooks. I can’t imagine a worse device for reading books, but they developed a Mac app, and an online ebooks store, and for a very little while, Palm was “it” for digital reading.
Anyway, yes, I bought this book, Vellum, I read, maybe, fifty pages, and I put it down. Then a few years later I bought it in Kindle format and I don’t know if I ever even opened it. Now, today, I’m into Vellum again, and this time, I’m going to finish it or die trying, which feels kind of possible. I think it’s called The Book of All Hours, because it takes all the hours of your life to get through it. I’ve been reading since I nabbed from iBooks three days ago and it feels like three years. I feel like it’s never going to stop, and the constant shifts in time, in perspective, in reality, they don’t help you feel like your moving forward or even backward, or even fucking sideways. It’s like reading words written on the tread of a treadmill. You just keep going ’round and ’round, world without end, Amen.
I’m going to finish, then I’ll write a full review, as opposed to this pre-review rant.
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Notes
So, I’ve definitely become a Kindle snob. I do all my reading with the Kindle for Mac app, which’s getting very robust. One new feature is Highlights & Notes, basically you can highlight passages and make margin notes. It seems simple, but I’ve never been able to mark up a book before, yet I’d always liked the idea. It’s really kind of romantic, marking words that feel important, then adding your own words and creating something new. It really helps me focus on the reading too, I’m intently looking for new passages to add to my collection. I feel like I’m building something, and words arranged beautifully are valuable, I like gathering them, keeping them all for myself. I also think creating margin notes is ultimately good for my own writing, it’s good just getting my thoughts out and organized. I can’t write in a vacuum, other people’s work inspires my own, keeping notes is a good way to solidify new ideas.
Eventually, I will start writing again, it’s what I do. It’s been a long slump, and I’m honestly embarrassed, and ashamed. I feel like I’m letting people down, like I’m wasting so much. I’m better than this, I’m going to be me again. In the meantime, I have my margin notes.
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