I received an email from Kobo the other day:
I thought it was time to share the story of the only book that ever conquered me. It’s not a very long one. Or even that interesting.
I’d always wanted to read Moby Dick (or The Whale) by Herman Melville so back in high school i decided to give it a go. I borrowed it from the library and i started reading it. It was one of the most tedious things i have ever done. I can’t remember how far i got into it, however i know that they had barely set sail and i was already at least a third of the way in (the book is about hunting a whale and the first third of the book isn’t even about that!) and the library informed me that i wasn’t allowed to re-borrow the book anymore. After re-borrowing it two or three times (i can’t remember which), you aren’t allowed to re-borrow a book (obviously because if they didn’t have that rule you could just re-borrow a book forever and never let anyone else have a chance at reading it). You then have a waiting period until you are allowed to re-borrow it. Well, that had never happened to me before! Usually i only re-borrowed a book because i had greedily borrowed too many books for the amount of time i had to read and hadn’t started them yet. But essentially being barred from a book? I felt like a criminal!
I guess the whole experience wounded my pride and i wasn’t game to pick the book up again in case i was once again barred from borrowing it (maybe forever this time?) so i just got on with life, shaking my fist every now and then when i heard the book mentioned.
However since i received for Christmas last year a Kobo Touch eReader, this has opened up an opportunity for me to finally finish what was started. Moby Dick is a classic. Most classics are free eBooks. Even if i only read a chapter a month (i hope to achieve more than that) it will only take 11 years and three months (only). Yes, that is a long time. Who knows what i will be doing then, however i’m only young and will still be young then!
If i did it too quickly, i’d have to come up with a new life goal 😉
Are there any books that have conquered you? Or have you finally conquered a book?
Reading For The Masses 