3 Books For a Desert Island – Blog Hop
Yesterday, as I lie in our Evil Bed (named this way because it’s so villainously comfortable that you don’t want to get up), I looked at what I’d consider rather a meager but nonetheless special bookshelf. Back in Ireland, and before that in Poland, I owned many more books, but my moving over to the USA forced me to be very picky of what I’d be taking with me (and believe me, I spent a lot of money to get those books over the pond), and what I might need to buy again in the future.
This got me thinking of the memory game from my youth, “What would you take if you were to go to a desert island?” in which one person mentions an item, and the next person has to repeat that item, then add another one to the list. After a while, the list would be quite long, and the loser would be the person who failed to list all the items in the right order.
As I looked at my precious books, I couldn’t help wondering: if I was to spend a year on a desert island, which three I’d pick? I was limited only to paperbacks and hardcovers, as an e-book reader would be useless without electricity, and to my surprise, instead of pondering the choices for hours, my list presented itself in an instant. (more…)
Before I even realized, another month passed by. After not so positive February, I was hoping to catch up with my projects, finish things from my to-do list, and be generally more productive than I was. How did it go? In short: not bad, though definitely not as well as I hoped for. 
Last year I had a chance to read a series of urban fantasy novels set in Ireland. I did it partially by my friend’s recommendation, and also as a part of my own comparative research for the novel set in Dublin I’ve been working on. And even though I can’t say I didn’t enjoy the story, reading each chapter of these books made me die inside a little. 
When over eight years ago I boarded the plane for the first time ever, I couldn’t help wondering whether I’d like flying. I still remember the first step I made on the steps leading up and the moment my other foot left the ground… My last step on the Polish ground for who knew how long: I was just about to immigrate to Ireland—excited, anticipating, maybe a bit worried—but I still couldn’t resist thinking of flying. After all, it’s the dreamer’s ultimate dream, isn’t it? 
Almost every advice out there tell aspiring writers they should read a lot. But the key is not really devouring as many books as possible, but making the reading into a lesson: studying plots, characterization, even the style. There’s much more to reading as a writer than it is to reading as a book lover, and even though writers mostly enjoy reading as much as any other bookworm, aside from entertainment, good story, and food for thought, we have other reasons to read too. 
Some of you might have heard about a successful video game series by CD Project called The Witcher, but probably not many know it all started with a short story sent to a contest organized by a Polish speculative fiction magazine. “The Witcher Saga” by Andrzej Sapkowski that grew out of this one story not only became a source of inspiration for the games, but is also a series on which a whole generation of Polish speculative fiction fans grew up, myself included. 
In today’s A to Z Challenge post I’m going back to Jacek Dukaj, brilliant Polish writer I mentioned already when I was writing about his novel, 
Apologies for my English-speaking readers, but today’s A to Z Challenge post is about a book available only in Polish. But do read on, as this is a beautiful story collection and who knows, maybe one day someone will translate it into Shakespeare’s language.