Making New Friends Because of Books and Writing

I am a fan of Clive barkers. Most authors, I read 1 or two of their books, and then I move on. I don’t know what it is about Clive Barkers writing but reading it makes me feel interested and I am rarely disappointed in the ending of his stories. Endings are probably the biggest letdowns of books. Endings are hard. I think I like Clive’s works because of the endings.

I went to a party this weekend and I ran into a fellow Clive Barker fan. I’ve met some online but never in reality have I met another person who had read The Hellbound Heart (the book Hellraiser is based on). We were playing board games, well I guess I should say, everyone else was playing board games.
It was nice to have a connection with a total stranger. He and I were both into the same works for the same reasons. Even if we did disagree on our tastes for the Scarlet Gospels…. But reading bridged that connection. It’s nice to find something in common with someone. It wasn’t like wen I meet someone whose into the same movies as I am. That’s a 2-3 hour dedication. Reading the books of blood and all the other works of Clive Barkers is a much thicker undertaking. The depth of data you have to pull from is greater than just watching 3-4 movies (at least to me). So we had this huge foundation to discuss and it was a great time.
I’d never experienced that in person. It struck me as amazing that a connection based on books could run so deeply in both of us. We’re friends now. Friends, because we like discussing these kinds of books.
When I think about how books and reading and writing have changed my life I think of situations like this.
In writing I have friends that I’ve made purely because we talk about writing and we encourage each other to continue writing and publishing. I’ve talked to many of the readers of this blog about writing on twitter. I know this because I’ll talk to them on twitter and then someone with the same name will follow my blog and start liking posts. These are good connections because we all want the same things.
I’m not sure where I’m going with this. I guess I am just sharing an experience. But thank you for reading. Thank you for interacting with me. Thank you for loving books and writing.