Georgette Heyer puts me to sleep
I’m not sure she would see this as a compliment, but in truth it is no reflection on her writing. Heyer’s novels are one of my guilty pleasures: I have listened to these audiobooks dozens of times. In fact, it’s because I know them so well that they are for me the perfect sleep-aid.Here’s how it works: I begin playing a favorite Heyer audiobook — The Grand Sophy or The Nonesuch or Black Sheep — turning the volume down so low I can almost not hear it. Then I set the sleep timer to 15 minutes, close my eyes, and listen as I drift off. Because the text is so familiar, I don’t need to pay close attention to the words — so it doesn’t keep me awake. At the same time, the story is interesting enough to give me something else to focus on when I’m anxious or preoccupied. It works brilliantly!
Then, when I wake up in the morning (or sometimes in the middle of the night), I can reset the player — or not — and continue listening without missing much. Admittedly, it can take a while to get through a whole book in this fashion, because I often fall asleep to the same section night after night!
A blessing on Ms. Heyer (somehow, she seems to call for a degree of formality) for her versatility in providing both amusement for my waking hours and a reliable avenue into sleep! I’m grateful for this “superlatively good writer of the honorable escape,” as A.S. Byatt famously named her.
Connections
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FantasticFiction: Georgette Heyer (source of the quote in the postcard)