The 12 Stages of a Book Hangover
All my life, I have experienced rapture while reading a great book. It's disorienting to finish the last page. To prolong my rapture, I reread the ending, savoring it. Then I flip back to passages that moved me, reading more slowly.
Sometimes I dive into another wonderful book by the same author.
Nora Ephron describes it well:
"There's something called the rapture of the deep, and it refers to what happens when a deep-sea diver spends too much time at the bottom of the ocean and can't tell which way is up. When he surfaces, he's liable to have a condition called the bends, where the body can't adapt to the oxygen level in the atmosphere. All this happens when I surface from a great book."
"The 12 Stages of a Book Hangover" by Faith Ann is hilarious:
8
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I have gotten so engrossed in a book that I can hardly do anything else but read it
BudFrank
Level 8
May 22, 2021
2
That happens to me nearly every time. I started checking out collections of short stories instead. Each delicious short story only encouraged me on to the next. Win-win.
I love to read also and yes there's nothing better than a good story, now on the other hand it's nitrogen bubbles that form in the bloodstream because the diver did not have/take enough time to decompress. 
oldFloyd
Level 8
May 22, 2021
1
It's like a man to focus on the technical, ignoring women's feelings.
At least you wrote: "Yes, there's nothing better than a good story."
I don't think I've ever had a book hangover, at least not as has been described. I do know the acute sense of loss when a really good book ends. And yes, I stay up way past my bedtime way too often to read a good book. And sometimes I do that with a book that is just OK. One of the last books I did a marathon read on was Patrick Rothfuss's Kingkiller Chronicles. Not my usual reading material, it was recommended by one of my kids. I read the first two right through. And then I found out the third and final has not been written yet!! I was horrified, and horribly angry. It has been 10 years since book two came out. Recently he had some fun with the waiting fans [winteriscoming.net]
HippieChick58
Level 9
May 22, 2021
2
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