(40) Books of Love

Well it looks like we're nearly half done, plus 10. I certainly hope my writing has improved, but I'm not sure whether or not I count as a critic to my own work. One thing I've noticed after publishing and re-reading is my insane use of commas.
I'm a very slow reader. Not slow as in illiterate or anything; maybe I should instead use the term "enthusiastic". Instead of quickly skimming a paragraph or quickly reading to obtain all the information as soon as possible, I take my time and truly read each sentence. I've never read anything in a dull, flat, monotone manner, and surprisingly I think a lot of people I know tend to do this. Whenever I read something, its always been in an energetic manner and full of emotion, as if I'm listening to the perfect narrator tell a good story or teaching me new things in a textbook or article. And when I read like this, I take short and quick pauses every-so often, thus when I write things, I think about those pauses and over-use the commas when they're not necessary.
I doubt I sound the least bit unique; I'm pretty sure most of you read this way too. I guess the first thing that popped into my mind are the people that don't do it this way. I just find it so unusual.

So I've at least tried to lessen my use of commas, and I think there's been an improvement. Now, instead of commas, I use over-use hyphens, and I barely even know how a semi-colon actually works, and yet I use that all the time, too. So the process repeats!

I've really been trying to keep reading Random Family, which is the book about the young girl caught up in gangs, but so far I've fallen a little behind on that. And the Lovely Bones? Totally lost track. As for Random Family, my falling-behind is mostly blamed on my recent busy schedule and my lust for the television.

The biggest annoyance I have of myself is picking up a book and never finishing it. If it doesn't catch my attention at least in the first 4-5 chapters, I usually get bored with it and give up. This is a major flaw because sometimes, things add up in the middle, or even the end of a book, thus creating huge scenes and putting all the "boring" things together and ultimately creating a fantastic story. I know this, and yet I still put books away and never touch them again. Maybe along with my fear of being watched by ducks, I have a fear of wasting time with a bad book. All the reading, all that fluff in between chapters, all that anticipation for a huge turn of events and it never happens. Its almost like dating, I suppose. Weird analogy, I know, but let me back it up.
You find someone you think is really interesting, so you flirt, and talk, and always wonder "whats going to happen next, and when?". After days or weeks of putting forth your best effort with barely one mention of the first date yet (though perhaps some unfair teasing or hard-to-get tactics), you decide that it's really not going anywhere. So you move on and find a better book. Though you always wonder what could have been, you never quite look back. Eventually it was going to end anyway; you saved yourself a heartache!

Maybe I need book-relationship therapy. I'm missing out on all kinds of potentially great books. I over-use commas and don't know 100% how a semi-colon works, and I've been feeling the wrath of hyphens everywhere. Save me!