Wednesday Words: The kind of education that’s been getting in the way of my… education

Keep your rigid opinions about when Wednesday is to yourself, y’all.

I am self-educated from genre books.

– Charlaine Harris, CLUB DEAD

I blew through all nine Sookie Stackhouse books in two and a half weeks, y’all. Master’s thesis? What Master’s thesis?

Actually, it turns out that there’s a reason for my inability to do much more than lie on the couch reading trashy novels and rubbing Cooper’s belly for several weeks — besides my incorrigible laziness, I mean — and that is Vitamin D deficiency. It turns out Vit-D isn’t something you want to mess around with. So now I am recovering with my prescription-strength vitamins (seriously?) and newfound will to accomplishing things. And mourning the loss of my muscles, my beautiful muscles, but my gym classes are just waiting for my return, my enthusiastic return, and so it goes.

Anyway, the Stackhouse books are hella predictable (like, when I can call all the plot twists, and I mean all, I have to consider the possibility that it’s not because I am a genius but rather that these books were designed that way), and when you read them right next to one another you see how completely full of continuity errors they are. Continuity errors, and also the kinds of repeated passages you get when you’re churning out a series, because there’s only so many ways to say

When Elizabeth looked at Jessica it was like gazing in a mirror. The same shoulder-length blond hair and aquamarine eyes, the same color as the Pacific Ocean. The twins shared perfect size-six figures. They were identical right down to the dimple in their left cheeks… until you got to their personalities, that is.

and if I hadn’t referenced the size-6 figures I would have referenced the birthmark on Elizabeth’s shoulder that was the only way to tell them apart because that’s how you knew if you were reading Sweet Valley High or Twins, is what I’m saying. Sometimes I felt like twenty percent of the Stackhouse books was this kind of repeated scene-setting, like how many times is Charlaine Harris going to have Sookie narrate that vampire-human marriages haven’t been legalized yet… not that any vampires have asked her? Seriously, how many times?

Nevertheless, these were intensely addictive, and I felt such profound relief when I had finished the last one (published so far) and could move on with my life. It reminds me of the extreme addiction I had for a while to Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series, and then suddenly I just… didn’t. I still own two more of the books, but I’ve never felt compelled to read them. I got over it.

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