I’m a pretty serious, and often intense, reader.

Sometimes I think it’s almost a disease — this fascination with all things books, writing, and publishing.  I’m that guy you see who picks up a magazine (on any topic!) while standing in the checkout line . . . just to have something to read.  I’ll read the backs of laundry pick-up slips while waiting in a drop-off line or the “How To Prepare Your Package for International Shipment” poster while in the post-office queue.

I read fiction (historical fiction, mostly European-related, mysteries, espionage, and literature) and non-fiction (business, how-to, current events) alike.

So, yeah, I read a lot, but I also go in spurts.

I can read three books in three days and then not read anything for a month.

But, when I get the hunger and just gotta have a new book in front of me, I can get pretty desperate.  I’ll walk around the bookstore for an hour or two and, if nothing seems to hit me, I’ll prowl the library . . . if nothing still works, I can get pretty kick-the-dog kind of edgy.

I’d recently been going through one of these can’t-find-a-book-to-save-my-life phases, when an author’s name jumped out at me from the Borders’ bookshelf — the writer is William Boyd and he can, quite simply, write the pants off of just about anyone else.  I’d kind of forgotten about him (having not read any of his stuff for a couple of years), but I almost wet my pants when I realized he has a new book out.

So, really, if you like great fiction — I wouldn’t really classify his stuff as historical fiction, but he does do sweeping across the 20th-century-Euro-themes a lot — grab this guy’s stuff.

His newest book (great, but not my favorite) is Restless, a two-in-one story about a daughter and a mother who’s not all she appears to be.  Great writing, great story line (contemporary and pre-WWII Europe), and just a fine piece of storytelling.

And, if you’re intrigued with this writer, know that his Any Human Heart is definitely a Top5er in my book, and might even be the single best thing I’ve read in the last 10 years.

Not far behind Any Human Heart is The New Confessions, which is also on my Top5er list.

All William Boyd stuff is really worth spending some time with.

Fortunately, I’ve recently (well, what took me so long, I don’t know!) developed a system whereby I stock up with books so that I’ll always have something on the shelf in my times of need.  The shelf is bulging with a pile-o-goodies right now, so I’m a smiling-and-reading fool at the moment.

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