You know that feeling, yes that feeling, the one where you wake up and for a few seconds there is total peace. There is a moment of stillness - a crystallised moment of calm - and then, just as fast as it settles over you, the stillness shatters and the world comes flooding in led by the thought of what you did the night before:
“Oh God.” You think to yourself. “I finished my book.”
I am saddened to inform you that you are suffering from a ‘book hangover.’
The feeling when, having immersed oneself so deeply in the fictional world weaved by an author, the abrupt ending of the novel leaves with it a groggy and confusing feeling of unreality, longing, and nostalgia. It happens most commonly with fiction and only ever with a book that leaves an indelible impact.
The symptoms are as follows:
Struggling to move on to a new book
General lethargy and emotional flatlining
Inability to stop thinking about the characters
Depleted interest in life as you knew it before
All is not lost. There are cures and coping mechanisms to deal with this affliction.
For the standard single novel or short series hangover cure we face a simple three step process:
Get out of the house, go for a walk, and let the sun hit your face. No one needs Vitiamin D deficiency on top of a hangover.
Have a conversation with someone who has also read the book (after all misery loves company)
Distract, distract, distract
Having gone through these steps there is only one true path forward:
Pick up a new book of either a similar genre or something so far away that you couldn't even closely confuse the genres (perhaps a nice non-fiction would do the trick) and begin to read something new.
The wonderful thing about the novel hangover is that eventually it will pass. You will find something else to read and to think about. The trick is learning to function in normal and acceptable society while it lingers; to go to work, to make dinner, to laugh with your family can feel nigh on impossible when one’s brain is on a far away in a coffee shop, science lab, or mountain range.
When the fever of the hangover eventually fades you will be glad to have taken preventative measures. Let your grief for being so forcefully ejected from a world that you loved roll through you and then let it go with a smile. You are fortunate to have been weaved into an enchantment of escapism and now you are in reality. Find the joy there too in small conversations and connections. The greatest loves of your life cannot truly be fictional; outside the world awaits and it is wide and full of wonder.
For those of you looking for a new read to get out of a slump these are some recent favourites of a hungover English Literature graduate:
Humour
My Family and Other Animals - Gerald Durrell
Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris
Fiction
The Bee Sting - Paul Murray
My Year of Rest and Relaxation - Ottessa Moshfegh
A Gentleman in Moscow - Amor Towles
Any Human Heart - William Boyd
Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis de Berniers
Short Stories
Last Night - James Slater
The Tell Tale Heart - Edgar Allan Poe
Fantasy
Fourth Wing - Rebecca Yarros
Six of Crows - Leigh Bardugo
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