This week The Broke and the Bookish has issued the challenge for 10 books that are set outside of the United States. I'm going to exclude fantasy like The Hobbit from this list because I feel that would be cheating.

Now, in no particular order:

1. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling (so obvious I almost feel like this is cheating, too)
   
2. The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis (yes, they're fantasy, but they start out in England)
   
3. Born in Fire by Nora Roberts (as well as the rest of the trilogy, all of which take place in Ireland)
   
4. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
   
5. Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare
   
6. The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck
   
7. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
   
8. Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
   
9. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
   
10. The Iliad by Homer
    

Obviously some of these are newer while most are old, and some of the authors are American while others were writing before the U.S. even existed. What books that are set outside the U.S. have you read?

I've been doing a lot of writing lately, which is great. It was one of my summer goals, and for the "lot of writing" I give myself a pat on the back. However, the writing I'm doing isn't always great (or even good), and I was getting disheartened.

Until this morning.

And no, I didn't all of a sudden write such a phenomenal passage that it reminded me that I am a good writer and that I can write a full, well-plotted, enjoyable, sellable book as long as I keep working.

No. This morning, I went for a run.

And I ran well.

I'm constantly in a state of "I wish I was a runner," so while my performance this morning would have had real runner's laughing their running shoes off, I was happy with myself. But what really struck me was the fact that, for the last week and a half, I was too lazy to get up in the morning and go for a run. I made excuses and slept in. But this morning I got up and I ran, and I did better than I did a week and a half a go.

The break helped.

And that reminded me that sometimes people need a break so that they can come back and do better. I took a break from running, and now I'm coming back and doing better. And I'm going to take a break from writing so that I can come back and do better.

I'm going to do more promoting and blogging now, and I just accepted my first editing job on Upwork, so I am going to worry about that for a couple of weeks and set my WIP aside. After the break, I'll come back stronger and write well.

​At least, that's the theory.