Misery hurts so good. Or at least it does in the case of a book hangover. We’ve all been there more than once. What are the symptoms? Mainly, it’s that hollow feeling we get inside that makes us not feel ready to start a new book. It’s almost as if the recently finished book has crawled inside our brains and taken up residence. The only real cure from a book hangover is to chase the next reading high by reading yet another book. And so it goes…
In the name of all things literary, I want to share a handful of books that reside in my very bones. I hope you will do the same. During my time as a submissions editor, it became clear just how many good stories there are in the world, and yet only a rare few have ability to linger with the reader long afterward. Maybe it all comes down to how readily we identify with the story. I know for certain, reading Hamlet gave me a book hangover from which I will never recover. Ever.
The Vampire Lestat: Vampires with real bite occupied my adolescence. There was something so lush about the settings and something so sensual about the characters. Lestat is the ultimate vampire. A brat prince. A rock star. He did whatever the hell he wanted and got away with it. The book scared the bejusus out of me, yet I read the Vampire Chronicle series over and over. Every time I turned off the light in my bedroom, visions of floating vampires just outside my window danced in my head.
The Color Purple: It’s safe to say Celie’s journey from voiceless to voiced self-actualized member of the human race struck a chord with me and opened my eyes to women’s issues and spirituality in general. Shug taught Celie how to be comfortable in her own skin, and I learned right along with them. In college, the book’s impact on me culminated with a piece of literary criticism: The God Within: Structure and Spirituality in The Color Purple. It’s now one of my most viewed posts on this blog.
The Grapes of Wrath: If Lestat shaped my sexuality, and Celie helped me find my voice, then I guess the plight of the Joad family taught me about how so many hard-working people just can’t seem to get ahead while corporations grow on the backs of struggling men. My worldview began to widen in scope thanks to Steinbeck. My consciousness deepened. The controversial ending, which I wrote about in Bonding with the Joads: Attaining Closure in The Grapes of Wrath, was just right.
Their Eyes Were Watching God: And then there is Janie. Where would I be without Janie? She had to learn about life and love the hard way, which is the only way to really learn anything at all. Struggle makes us real. Without struggle we cannot appreciate the good things. Often, it’s profound loss that leads the way. I related to this book twenty years ago, and even more now after a gut-wrenching divorce. Life is struggle and suffering. In other words, impermanent and changeable. Fear not. Just be.
What was the last or most memorable book hangover you experienced? What about the story gripped you so?
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Haven’t read Lestat or Their Eyes Were Watching God yet. Both are on my TBR. Hmmm…the last book that made me feel this way was The Absolutist. I really enjoyed that book and it was hard to stop thinking about it. Also, Tell The Wolves I’m Home.
TB, I’ve been wanting to go back and read The Vampire Chronicles to see how they strike me now as opposed to when I read them in high school. I love Rice’s vampires so much and practically wanted to be Lestat for a couple of years back in the day 🙂 Based on the title alone, I think I’ll look up Tell the Wolves I’m home and add it to my TBR list.
I loved Interview With A Vampire, but never ventured past that one. Not sure why. And The Grapes of Wrath is another favorite. Embarrassed to admit not having read The Color Purple, but I did read Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Bleak House by Dickens and Middlemarch by Eliot both left their marks on me. With Bleak House, it was the abject poverty and illiteracy that he so keenly (and painfully) scored on my brain. Middlemarch for Dorothea, for the woman who strives for social justice and the love she deserves. Life in the Iron Mills by Rebecca Harding Davis for Davis’s realistic portrayal of early industrial America and the laborers it ate up.
The one novel that I keep thinking about these days, even though I only read it once: The Handmaid’s Tale by Atwood. I remember very well reading it when I was still living in San Francisco in the late 80s. It frightened me then because I saw the potential for this novel to be realistic rather than speculative. Thinking about it now, I often feel horror at the thought that we may be on the border of that kind of future.
Marie, you should give The Color Purple a Read. The epistolary format suits it well and I love how well Walker portrays Celie writing herself into existence as she becomes more literate. I’m embarrassed to admit I have yet to read Middlemarch. It’s only 0.99 right now for Kindle, so I think I’ll give it a download. I should add too that Atwood’s novel is definitely on my top-ten list of books that have stuck with me.
God Shaped Hole by Tiffani deBartolo. Sometimes I still think about those characters, and it’s been over a year since I read.
There Eyes Were Watching God stayed with me for a long time too.
Mandi, I think I remember you mentioning God-Shaped Hole on your blog and I added it to my Amazon list. The problem with the Amazon list is that it keeps getting longer and longer!
Ahh, the book hangover. I know it well and there’s not enough aspirin in the world. It’s the sign of a life well lived, in my opinion. I LOVED Their Eyes Were Watching God. One of the books that has stuck with me is A Prayer for Owen Meany.
Meredith, I’ve heard of A Prayer for Owen Meany and just read that it also inspired the Jim Carrey movie Simon Birch. Any work of literature that gets compared to Flanner O’Connor’s work is definitely one that piques my interest.
I have never felt such a lasting impression of a book but that could be due to passing of that impressionable age when each character leaves a mark. Since I couldn’t get the exposure to the age appropriate books till I chose literature as my major, I was greatly moved by the Merchant Of Venice and the pound of flesh that Shylock demands still haunts me!
In the recent times, A Thousand Splendid Suns stayed with me for a long time and I couldn’t like any book after reading this novel. Vampire books have never attracted me and I had to abandon Dark Places due to the gory details. A book is an experience in itself and if it stays pleasant, it can be enjoyed more.
YES!
Balroop, A Thousand Splendid Suns always comes to mind as one of the Great Powerful Books! xx
Balroop, you have such great tastes in books. I’ve heard so much about Khaled Hosseini books, but have yet to read a single title. I really need to fix that gaping hole in my reading background.
My most memorable book in my private library is The God Game by Andrew Greeley. I couldn’t help contemplating on it at certain places within the pages because it was some mind-blowing to me.
The most recent one that refuses to leave me goes along the same lines of thought, which I thought was peculiar — The Da Vinci Code.
Glynis, I just read the blurb for The God Game. The premise sounds interesting. I love books that take the reader on a mind-trip of sorts. The only downside is that it’s not available in e-book format.
Ahhhh…I feel like I am perpetually hung-over! LOL I can’t remember a time in my life when I haven’t been reading a book! One down, pick up another. My list includes (in part) The Art of Racing in the Rain, Beach Music, Prince of Tides, Pillars of The Earth, Atlas Shrugged, Widow of The South, Finn…oh my. Now I can’t stop!!!
Jacquie, I can tell we have some memorable book hangover titles in common. The Art of Racing in the Rain just might be the best dog book I’ve ever read. I remember crying like a little baby as I read it and especially when I finished it. I recently listened to the audio book of The Prince of Tides. I’ve always loved that novel, and it captures the South and Charleston so well. Conroy is a genius like that. Plus, the audio book narration was superb. I know I’ll listen it it again someday because it was so well done.
Love the phrase book hangover. But it is hard to let go of some – and so disappointing when you’ve finished. I’d certainly agree with Grapes of Wrath, especially with such a blow you away ending. Blind Assassin is another fav. of mine and Skin Lane by Neil Bartlett is another. I recently read The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, and while I’m not sure if I had a hangover from it, but I couldn’t put it down. I love the thug notes BTW – a brilliant teaching tool & just plain entertaining.
A. K., yeah the Thug Notes videos were a pleasant find when I was preparing this post. I just looked up Skin Lane on Amazon. It had me at the words “sexual obsession.”
***books that reside in my very bones.***
OOooo, I feel that…I know that feeling, Jeri,
I dig how you describe those words, Oh-Those-Words heavy & drenched inside our bones!
Nabokov’s, Lolita made me feel like that.
***“if a violin string could ache, i would be that string.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita***
OoooooooooooMYGOD, I am drunk on his words.!
xxx
PS. I also had a hangover from The God of Small Things & To Kill a Mockingbird & Eat Pray Love & The Bell Jar & Caged Bird……So Many Hangovers.
Kim, Lolita is definitely a book that stuck with me long after finishing it both times I’ve given it a read. Nabokov tells such a haunting story, but also with such haunting language. That is a fabulous quote you included in your comment. Sigh… wish I could write that pretty 😉
I was entranced by Shon Hopgood’s redemption from bank robber, prison inmate, and eventual rehabilitation as a law clerk to an Appeals Court Judge. I eventually re-read his autobiography, Highly recommend “Law Man: My Story of Robbing Banks, Winning Supreme Court Cases, and Finding Redemption.”
Jennette, I do love a good autobiography every now and again so thanks for mentioning Hopgood’s book. Stories of such transformation never fail to appeal to me.
I love the term book hangover. Is there a term for the pre-hangover phase? The part where you’re nearing the end of a book and eager to keep reading to find out what happens, but reluctant to go on and end your time with the book? I’ve had lots of books stay with me after I finished them, so it is hard to single a few out. My most recent reads with that effect have been All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews and And The Birds Rained Down by Jocelyne Saucier. From time to time something triggers a book I’ve read ages ago to come back to mind and I have a little hang-over again.
Donna, I don’t know what the proper term would be, but I’m guilty as charged when it comes to not wanting a book to end at times so I will purposefully draw out my reading a bit longer. Sometimes, I kind of like to play a memory type of game where I will conjure up scenes from favorite books that left a lasting impressing on me and think about why in terms of language but also in terms of emotional impact. My favorite ending to a book is Norman MacLean’s A River Runs Through It. All that business about being haunted by waters…
There are actually more than one book hangovers here. I suppose one of my more recent reads I’m still reaching for is When God Spoke to me. Lots of short stories that hang around my mind and heart.
Patricia, my heart just skipped a beat! Glad to hear you’re a fan of short stories 🙂
I’m actually having a hangover now after finishing “Plainsong” by Kent Haruf. Told in a simple, straightforward style, Haruf’s characters grabbed my heart and still won’t let go. It’s such a surprise because it’s a slow-paced story without too much drama although characters have “troubles.” He chose the right details to capture and captivate me.
On the classics list it’s David Copperfield and Huckleberry Finn for me. Also, To Kill a Mockingbird.
Anything by Kuzuo Ishiguru–pitch perfect emotional writing.
…and so many more.
Jagoda, it’s good to see you again. I’m drawn to straightforward styles, so I will definitely give Haruf’s book a look.
Oooh, these are great, Jeri! I loved the Lestat books by Ann Rice. I read them in my 20’s. The Sun Also Rises really left a book hangover for me. Pride and Prejudice, A Map Of The World, Breathing Lessons, The Accidental Tourist, Sophie’s Choice, The World According To Garp then A Prayer For Owen Meany, Rabbit Run and all the Rabbit books by John Updike. I’m probably forgetting some… 🙂
Lisa, so many books so little time! Sophie’s Choice stayed with me for a really, really, really long time. That’s definitely a gut-wrenching one to read and Meryl Streep played the role perfectly in the movie version of Styron’s book.
What a great list!
Making me think about the books that continue to echo years (even decades) after I read them. The Brimstone Wedding by Barbara Vine (aka Ruth Rendell), Peter Pan (the real book not the Disney version), An Anthropologist on Mars by Oliver Sacks, and many, many more…
Candy, I still have some Ruth Rendell book’s on my TBR list from a while back when you mentioned her name at some point. I need to push them up on my list. I loved the real Peter Pan book as well. I just looked up Sacks’s collection of tales. His name rings a bell. Maybe he had an essay in the Best American series at some point?
‘I know why the cage bird
sings ‘ impacted on me as a teenager. Maya Angelou’s unstable upbringing, sexual abuse, confusion and the racial tension that existed back then. I remember picturing every scene.
Phoenicia, I read Angelou’s book when I was a sophomore in high school. The portrait she painted of her childhood really stuck a chord with me. We are so lucky to have writers like her in the world who can share their stories of pain in order to help us make sense of our own.
“The case of a book hangover. … that hollow feeling we get inside that makes us not feel ready to start a new book”…
I have been through that feeling… and the books pleaded guilty were many and, what it is even better, absolutely different ig being compared one to the other… I’ll mention five books that really stroke me, in a personal way:
Haruki Murakami’s “Dance, Dance, Dance”, Truman Capote’s “In Cold Blood”, Henry Miller’s “Tropic of Capricorn”, Marcel Proust’s “Swan’s Way”, Jane Austen’s “Persuasion”…
[Needless to say that when I experience the book hangover feeling, I keep on reading other books by that same author]
I think that there are books that leave a mark on us… I definitely think that we might change as we read them….
Thanks for another great reading, dear Jeri… All my best wishes, as always. Aquileana 😀
Aqui, the titles you list by Capatoe, Miller, and Proust are all on my list of books I want to read someday. After seeing a video on the literary philosophy of Proust last week, I think I’m more likely to start with one of his titles. Best wishes to you as well 🙂
Jeri, I’m not into vampires and things so haven’t read the first book. My favourite book, and one that always makes me cry, is ‘The Grapes of Wrath’. So powerful.
Can’t say I’m having a book hangover right now though. When I’m a bit tired like now I read ‘fluff’ books – not exactly something to get a hangover about.
Lenie, I like how you put that. Yet, even though “fluff” books might not give us hangovers, they certainly have their place when our minds don’t need to get put through the ringer.
Great idea: book hangover. I definitely relate to that. If I were not on vacation I’d devote some time to thinking about what are my top faves but I’m so eclectic. Everything from The Karamazov Brothers to The Wasteland to To Kill a Mockingbird to The Help to … I can’t do it! Too overwhelming! Great post!
Beth, I’m definitely an eclectic reader as well. I really need to get around to reading The Brothers Karamazov one of these days…
Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief. Can’t think of any books that were so emotionally engaging. One night I actually started crying while reading it on a commuter train on the way home from work.
Ken, I haven’t read The Book Thief, but the movie version was certainly a tear-jerker. Books that can cause that kind of emotional response are ones I seek out time and time again.
You have mentioned some of my favorites, Jeri. Particularly Grapes of Wrath and The Color Purple. I hate that feeling when you are coming to the end of a great book and you try to drag it out as long as possible, just not wanting it to be over. Or you just keep hoping there will be a sequel so you can continue on and jump back into the story. Some books are so good that you just think there will never be another one that compares. Sometimes if we are lucky another great one comes along, but some books just stick in our minds forever.
Susan, I would be curious what my average must be for those books that stick with me. It must be something like one in every 25. Or maybe that’s too generous…
I love to read so much it’s tough to pick out just a few, but Color Purple is definitely a favorite. Also The Good Earth and one I especially love is A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines. I also have a nice collection of books about Hawaiian culture and my favorite is Ku Kanaka Stand Tall – not a light read by any means – but it’s a sentimental favorite because I had the privilege of learning from the late George Kanahele in the process of developing cultural enrichment programs. Inspiring post Jeri!
Marquita, speaking of your books on Hawaiian culture, I’ve often thought of seeing what links I can collect related to Idaho culture. I’m sure it would be much less a lengthy list than Hawaii’s, but fun to pursue nonetheless.
WOW! We have a very different book collection. I haven’t read any of the books you mentioned. It’s so awesome, hearing about books I haven’t read, and how they impact other readers.
I would probably say the most recent memorable book hangover I had, even though it was an audiobook, was The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. It opened my eyes to how horrible life was for immigrants. How they thought the U.S. was the promised land, yet many lost their lives to poverty and corruption.
Denise, I’m drawn to stories of immigrants as well. Steinbeck’s Tortilla Flat comes to mind as one I’d like to read again.
I have got to read some of these books. I have never read any of them. I just girl on the train. That was a page turner. I was thinking about it when i finished it. I am always looking for the next good book to read Because i want to chase that high of totally being immersed in a book. Thanks for the great post! 🙂
Crystal, I listened to the Audible version of The Girl on the Train and really liked it. I tend to be drawn to unreliable narrators.
Oh, I know that feeling well and a hangover is a great way to describe it. A book that just sits in your mind and sends you dreaming for as long as it is resident. For me I have a few. The Glass Palace, The Piano Tuner, and Burmese Days by George Orwell had me traveling back in time.
Tim, it’s been awhile since I’ve ready some Orwell, but he’s an author I go back to time and time again.
The last book hangover that I had was after I finished “1984” by George Orwell. That book had my mind thinking too much for a couple of days.
Jason, I’ve only read 1984 once, but I had to teach Animal Farm to high school sophomores for six years straight so I’ve read it over twenty times at this point and it never gets old 😉
I think the last book I read that really did it for me was “Pope Jane”. I still think of that story. I have tried to pick other books to read and find I compare it to this one. I read Grapes of Wrath and The Color Purple so many years ago and I must say both of these stories resonates with me today.
Arleen, I found a “Pope Joan” but not a “Pope Jane” on Amazon. If that’s the book you mean, it definitely sounds like one I would like. It’s so interesting how we find milestone books that set the standards for the others we will then read in the future.
Jeri- Sorry I meant “Pope Joan”
Another great post.
As for me, I wished I had time to read more, but I get my book hangover from writing.
I am in the process of writing my sequel to “Legend of the Mystic Knights”, and after I write some, I find the characters are still with me for the rest of the day.
William, that’s one of the most addictive parts about writing as well… the way our characters still with us even when we’re not typing.
I recently finished Frank Herbert’s Dune (first time reading it amazingly). All through the book I was pretty surprised to see how much David Lynch captured of the overall feel of the story when he made the Dune movie in the mid 80s.
Jon, Dune is actually a sci-fi book I’ve had on my TBR list for quite some time. Though not a genre I read a lot, I am at least trying to read the top titles that come to mind as seminal works. I remember watching Dune on HBO over and over and over when I was a kid. I had the biggest crush on Sting and those eerie blue eyes 😉
I’ve gone through a few hangovers and right now seems to be one of those periods. It’s not that the Beach was the greatest book but I came away asking for more. Trying to cleanse my palette has been a challenge. More memorable book hangovers include Housseini’s Kite Runner and all of his wonderful books, to be honest. His books have opened me up to a dark and chaotic part of this world (Afghanistan) that I was pretty clueless about, sadly. I can’t wait for his next one but in the meantime, others have given me more recent hangovers.
Murakami’s quite intense, too, and is probably the latest book hangover I’ve come down with. 1Q84 is thankfully broken into 3 books and I needed a break after the first. For some reason, his books just take me too far away from the real world. I know some people are turned off by his vivid sexuality and mixture of creepy sci-fi but for me, that stuff isn’t the most important part. I’m always in love with his flawed yet real characters, no matter how impossible they might seem. My connection with his books is kind of scary and I wonder if you’ve ever found something similar.
Any thoughts on Murakami or that type of a connection?
Duke, I keep hearing so many great things about The Kite Runner. This post has convinced me to add it to my TBR list. I’m not overly familiar with Murakami either, but based on how you describe his work, I can tell I would be drawn to his books as well.