The Subtle Terror of Rereadability

and the joys of turning pages slow, not fast

When I was a kid, I read Diana Wynne Jones’ DOGSBODY eleven times, back to back.

I remember the experience very clearly: the weather that week, the character of the light in my bedroom, the gentle dated hideousness of the library edition’s cover. I was not (and still am not) a fast reader, so this process of rereading was a lengthy one.

Now, Diana Wynne Jones is better known for a book called HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE. “Try Diana Wynne Jones,” everyone invariably says, “and make sure you start with Howl’s Moving Castle.” I liked that one, but I didn’t reread it eleven times back to back. I didn’t have to, because I knew why I enjoyed it the first time through. Howl is a charming book, a likable book, a book that smiles at you right away as it shakes your hand.

DOGSBODY is not that. It has an odd, convoluted premise—after being accused of an amorphous crime, the dog star Sirius goes to Earth in the form of a dog to make it right, getting tangled up with the daughter of an imprisoned IRA man along the way—and it does not dart to the easy, big conflicts that such a summary naturally suggests. We are not headed to car bombs nor to intergalactic battles. We’re headed to a subtle class and political conflict seen opaquely through the eyes of a powerful narrator trapped in a powerless form, a novel about congenital misfits. What a nifty thing to do in a children’s book, guys. What a weird thing to do in a children’s book.

I do not tell people to start with DOGSBODY, because I can’t trust them to reread it or wallow in it, and without that, it’s just a very lumpy, dusty Diana Wynne Jones, uncertain in its pleasures. And I don’t blame people for not re-reading; time’s short. Every week, a billionty new books come out (that’s an official statistic, obviously), and if you reread, gosh, how will you keep up? But back when I was eleven, I could afford to be unhurried, free of any FOMO, because I was a library kid, working my way through the slowly molting stacks, not realizing that new feathers were ever added from the outside world.

Now I am a novelist, and my genre is rereadable. I want a novel that delivers a new small pleasure with every dive, pages you can wallow in, words that were all on purpose, a book that is more pleasurable the second or third time around, a book that you can live in, a book that will be someone’s favorite. But there is a terror to releasing such novels. All soundbites will invariably be truthful but inaccurate, inadequate: it’s about teenagers looking for a buried king; it’s about an island that races killer horses; it’s about cousins who can perform miracles; it’s a hotel tasked with the hateful task of housing Axis diplomats. All these hooks are true and untrue. Big, fast-paced versions of those soundbites unspool in the reader’s mind, and invariably, the novel is not that. The real novel is hidden in the reread. This is how I like it; the books are a secret, available to anyone who decides not just to read them, but to pack a suitcase and live inside them.

Here is a my confession: I know how to write the fast versions of all of my books. When I wrote Shiver, my goal was to see if I could write a novel that gripped your arm the very first time around, and it was a many-million copy success. And oh God! It is dangerously seductive, to imagine writing lean, accessible novels that look the reader in the eye the very first time they meet, instantly likable. As someone who pays the bills with this career, I am not immune to the siren song of writing something that might win Booktok. My car needs a new bumper. Self-insured health insurance is very expensive. Children are a really expensive lifelong hobby.

But.

But.

When I was not long out of college, the Shins released a song called “Phantom Limb.”

This was in the era of radio, regular radio. In my Virginia town, you could get a pop station, an alt station, a classical station, a news station. My car had a tape deck; my sister’s had a new-fangled CD player. It was a more patient era. You waited for the songs you wanted to hear, enduring endless songs you didn’t, and when it was over, you called the radio station endlessly to request it and pined when they ignored you (even if you bought the tape, you had to rewind to hear it again, knowing you were slowly killing the cassette every time you listened and listened and listened and listened—).

I didn’t like “Phantom Limb” when I first heard it. I didn’t dislike it either, it was just a song to endure until the next one came on. The next time I heard it, I still didn’t like it. Or the next. And the next. The DJs raved about it; why? I listened, I didn’t like it, I endured it. But at some point, I realized there was a keening note at just about a minute in that I was obsessed with. I realized I was pining when it was done. I realized it had become the song that I endured other songs to reach. I realized I had to buy the album; I had to wear it out.

Here is the thing about the media that takes longer to reveal itself; it sticks with you. It has been just under twenty years since “Phantom Limb” came out, and I still listen to it wistfully every time it rotates around in my collection. I don’t listen to my other fast favorites of 2006-7. I’d used them up by the time the next batch of bangers rolled out. But “Phantom Limb,” like my other enduring favorites, rewarded the reread. And now I know myself: my playlists are filled with transient songs I like at once, songs that will hold me for a season, but also with songs that need me to take my time. I’m now well-trained in recognizing cautious intrigue rather than immediate attraction. I now understand why pro reviews are useful; these are folks who are well-trained in the art of spotting media that might endure.

But these songs and these books aren’t great radio hits. They aren’t 2-3 minutes long with a hook inside the first minute. They will never be the song that millions hum in the shower. Do the artists know that when they create them? Are they terrified by the risk of asking for patience, like I am? And do they sit down and do it anyway?

I don’t know, but I’m so grateful for my rereadable favorites (Dogsbody! Piranesi! A Wrinkle in Time! Cloud Cuckoo Land! Peace Like a River! Jurassic Park! I Capture the Castle! The Great Gatsby!). And I’m very grateful to my own re-readers, as I release yet another novel that is slow to release its secrets. You can read about THE LISTENERS’ pleasures in the reviews from the ol’ DJs of the trade publishing world here, but I will be honest: I don’t expect you to see them until the second time around.

Terrifying!