Procrastiread / prô’kræstairid/ verb (procrastiread, procrastireading) – 1. to delay finishing a book: I procrastiread my last book for three days. 2. purposely reading slowly so as to not reach the end of a book: the reader was procrastireading because of an emotional connection with the characters of a book in such a deep-felt way that to end the book would result in severing the relationship. [Latin]  – procrastireader, n.

Have you ever found yourself reading a book whose characters endear you, become your friends, become your soulmates and envelop you into their lives to the point that soon you realise that you are half way through your book? And with every page you are getting closer to the end of your relationship with these people. Sure, you are the passive person in this relationship where all others are walking, talking and interacting with each other yet ignoring you. But you are the one who is setting the pace, you are the one that decides when the next words in their story will be read. You are the one that can evoke a procrastiread.

The other day, on Twitter, I took part in a short exchange where @stephjhodgson tweeted that she was stretching the ending of the Stieg Larsson series, @Wateryone asked me if there was a word for that.

I couldn’t find an Oxford Dictionary word or definition for this behaviour . But now, there is a word that we can all use – procrastireading/procrastiread

Over the years there have been few books that I have procrastiread. For the most part, if I am enjoying a book, I need to finish it quickly. I fly through it. I stay up until 3 or 4 in the morning with my obsessive need to know how it finishes despite the fact that I read the ending before I started the book and despite the fact that I will be a mess at work that day. But once in a while I am captured. I am enchanted by every word and phrase. I am lost within the book and I just don’t want it to finish. So I stretch out my reading experience over a number of days.

My most memorable procrastiread has been Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie. Not only are the main characters Cal and Min perfectly matched with their sharp banter from the beginning of the story but their friends also became my friends. I felt captured by them. I was engaged and amused by the narrative and the dialogue. I was invested in these people and as I felt the thickness of the book’s pages in my right hand lessen, I realised that I no longer would have these wonderful friends with me. They would cease to exist. But not if I read only sections at a time. Slowly, savouring each exchange and every nuance. And once I came to the end of the story, I was thankful to Jennifer Crusie who gave me a snapshot epilogue of “Where are they now” for each wonderful character.

I really do miss them.

Have you ever found yourself procrastireading?