If you’re a bookworm, I’m sure you get frustrated. Honestly, at this point it’s a rite of passage. If you don’t get frustrated by being interrupted by someone or something, then you either found an oasis in the middle of the desert or you’re in a dream because, let me tell you, that never happens.
Honestly! Isn’t it a pet peeve for people to be interrupted repeatedly because others assume that we’re “doing nothing” when we’re reading? The gall of those people is astonishing!
Why don’t I go and walk up to the bathroom door while you’re in there and tell you to do my laundry because you’re obviously not busy at all at that moment? Oh, you’re planning on going to the movie theatre? Too bad! You have to cut the grass for me.
I guess it’s for the best though. I’d read throughout every hour of the day until I was finished if no one interrupted me. The same way Sleeping Beauty slept for a hundred years, I could read for a hundred years.
Anyways, I’m sure all you non-readers are wondering how anyone could ever want to spend one hundred years reading. I’m here to tell you right now, it’s the freakin cliffhangers. I’m one of those people who has to stop reading at the end of a chapter or else it bothers me that I couldn't finish it.
However, a lot of the books I read are written by authors who like to leave cliffhangers at the end of... Every. Single. Chapter. It’s driving me insane. All I ask is for a break every seven chapters or so.
I know hooks and cliffhangers help people stay focused on reading your books, but there is such a thing as “too focused.” My mom always says a bomb could go off right beside me and I wouldn’t even notice with my nose stuck in my book. I’m beginning to realize that this is a bad thing.
Also! Never ever tell a reader that they have too many books. I’m telling you, you will always lose the argument that comes afterwards. And there will always be an argument after that sentence! So if you want to keep your lover, don’t say a word. Then again, if you want to break up with someone who loves reading, I suppose you just found the right way to do it.
You know that frustration you get when you’re in a slow-moving crowd of people, but you’re in a rush to get somewhere? Well, being interrupted when I’m reading feels a lot more frustrating than that.
Maybe I should just hang a sign around my neck whenever I’m reading that says: “In fairy land. Will not respond to her name being called. Please refrain from touching. Thank you.” I mean, it could work. Don’t knock it till you try it, right?
Kaylee Whipple is a Grade 10 student at Philemon Wright from Gatineau and wrote the following for an English assignment, which we thought was great to kick off the summer reading season.