Reading Slumps

I'm in a reading slump. No book can hold my attention for longer than a chapter. I have 7 books sitting on my nightstand with bookmarks in them. I'm reading books by authors that I normally love, so what's wrong with me?

Reading slumps usually happen around once a year for me. In a normal month I'll read between 10 and 15 books -- not bad considering I work full-time and have 2 small children. Last month I only read 4 books and this month I'm not doing much better.

Since I haven't been reading much, I've been watching movies. I signed up for the new Blockbuster movies by mail service and have been having a blast. We have a Blockbuster store about a mile from us and with the new program you can return your movies to the store and get a free movie to take home. So for the same price I was paying at Netflix, I can get twice as many movies. Since I can never get near a TV set in my house, I've been renting the TV shows on DVD and watching them on my portable DVD player. I have been watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer and am now starting Season 4. It's funny to me that I'll watch movies and shows in a genre that I would never read in. Take Buffy -- I really love the show, but can't stand vampire romances. What's romantic about falling in love with a dead guy?

When I'm in a reading slump, I spend a lot of time trolling review sites looking for the book that is going to get me out of the slump. I tend to try a lot of new-to-me authors hoping that I just need a fresh voice to get me going again. So far it hasn't worked. I tried Julia Ross last night, an author whose books had recommendations from some of my favorite authors, but couldn't get past the third chapter. Any little historical inconsistency throws me off these days and the book hits the pile on my nightstand.

Hopefully this nasty slump will end soon and I can return to regular reading. Until then, I can find out how Buffy will survive without Angel...