appetite

My appetite has been leaving me. She is sometimes with me in the mornings, when I wake up, but by lunchtime, she is a faint pang, and by dinner, a distant memory. I don’t know how to lure her back. I’ve tried tempting her with all the best take-out, coaxing her with a glass of wine, but it’s been two weeks, and I’m starting to wonder if she’ll ever return. Eating used to be a bright spot in the day, something to look forward to - but now it’s starting to feel a bit like a chore. I miss my appetite; without her, food doesn’t taste the same.

My appetite and I haven’t always had the smoothest relationship. When we were young, it was easy. My appetite was bottomless, and I had a metabolism that ran like a cheetah, so I could (and did) eat whatever she craved without thinking twice. But as I got older, my appetite craved all the new, different foods I was encountering, while my stomach seemed to keep getting smaller. I hadn’t appreciated my capacity to eat when I should have; though, really, who appreciates the things they should in their teenage years? She and I have had a contentious relationship these past five years, as she’s had to accept that I can’t eat everything she wants, and I’ve had to accept that eating everything she wants really doesn’t make me happy, no matter how hard she tries to convince me it will. She and I had been starting to come to a middle ground more often, in the last year, but then she disappeared.

I have wondered, in these past two weeks, if my appetite has been jealous. Along with being a voracious eater in my childhood, I was a voracious reader. I would order books from the library by the dozen - the check-out limit. It was a regular stop for us while driving through town, to drop off and pick up books. I used to hide under the covers with a flashlight to read at night when I was supposed to be asleep.

I discovered a love for fantasy novels through Tamora Pierce. If I’m remembering correctly, the librarian introduced me to her books, after observing my reading habits. Her first series was about a girl who disguises herself as a boy to be able to go and become a knight. I had dabbled a bit in fantasy series aimed at younger readers before this one, but this was the first with a heroine; something I didn’t know at the time I wanted, and something that is sadly still too rare in the genre.

Most people think of the Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones when they think fantasy novels. They’re not wrong. Those are some of the defining works of classic fantasy , but they’ve also gained popularity because of their movie and TV adaptations. There is so much more out there - a lot of which, in my opinion, is more creative and more compelling.

During a vacation in February, I started reading again. And I got hooked onto a fantasy series that has fourteen books. This was my own fault, really; I knew the length of the series going in, but I really thought I wouldn’t like it so much. Instead, I have found myself reading before and after work, and ordering my library books in threes and fours so I have the next book ready when I finish the current one. I have been devouring them; there’s no other word for it. As of this post, I’ve finished the ninth book, and am eagerly awaiting my next set of three from the library. Luckily they are all paperbacks, or I’d be getting quite a workout trekking these back and forth from the library. Checking out a dozen books is much easier when you have a car.

And so, I have wondered if my appetite is jealous, that she has had to share my love for food with my love for reading more often than she has in the last ten years. I have had spurts of avid reading during my adulthood, but they rarely lasted this long - I never had made enough time to make it a priority. Time for reading felt like a luxury; perhaps it still is, but I’ve been trying to make space for more of the little luxuries of life lately. I need bright spots to fill the void my appetite has left, until she comes back to me.

Reading List: Fantasy Recommendations
These are a few of my favorite authors and books from the last ten years.

V.E. Schwab - A Darker Shade of Magic (trilogy), Vicious and Vengeful
Brandon Sanderson - Mistborn (trilogy)
Laini Taylor - Daughter of Smoke and Bone (trilogy), Strange the Dreamer (duology)
N.K. Jemisin - The Broken Earth (trilogy), The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms (trilogy) - she has also given talks about world building
Madeline Miller - Circe, The Song of Achilles (both standalone, Greek mythology)
Naomi Novik - Uprooted, Spinning Silver (both standalone)
Alix E. Harrow - The Ten Thousand Doors of January, The Once and Future Witches (both standalone)
Neil Gaiman - American Gods, Norse Mythology
Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett - Good Omens (a dark comedy)
Seanan McGuire - Every Heart a Doorway and related books (Wayward Children series)