Why We Read
On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out
Ratings4
Average rating4.4
15
On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out
Ratings4
Average rating4.4
A hilarious and incisive exploration of the joys of reading from a teacher, bibliophile and Thurber Prize finalist
We read to escape, to learn, to find love, to feel seen. We read to encounter new worlds, to discover new recipes, to find connection across difference, or simply to pass a rainy afternoon. No matter the reason, books have the power to keep us safe, to challenge us, and perhaps most importantly, to make us more fully human.
Shannon Reed, a longtime teacher, lifelong reader, and New Yorker contributor, gets it. With one simple goal in mind, she makes the case that we should read for pleasure above all else. In this whip-smart, laugh-out-loud-funny collection, Reed shares surprising stories from her life as a reader and the poignant ways in which books have impacted her students. From the varied novels she cherishes ( Gone Girl , Their Eyes Were Watching God ) to the ones she didn’t ( Tess of the d’Urbervilles ), Reed takes us on a rollicking tour through the comforting world of literature, celebrating the books we love, the readers who love them, and the surprising ways in which literature can transform us for the better.
Reviews with the most likes.
This was more of a memoir/tongue-in-cheek nonfiction about the reasons the author reads, with some bonus advice about how we can use her experiences to improve our own reading. It's basically a series of essays about various topics related to reading--everything from the author's early experiences in a library to how to read horror if you're a scared reader to teaching a classroom of students how to appreciate Lincoln in the Bardo to a lot more diverse topics.
Not a lot connects one essay to the next except the author's life and reading, but it was an interesting listen none-the-less. It was a great audiobook for me to listen to, as I feel like if I were reading it I would start getting bored of the meandering-ness of the book. I did get some things out of it, and really liked her approach to working in poetry that I might consider doing, but not a lot will stick with me now that it's done.
I do think the author has a great sense of humor and outlook on life though. It was an amusing book to listen to, if nothing else.
I lament that I started this on audiobook when I should have known I was too busy to focus, I also lament that I went into it with a slight misperception about the focus of the book. Once I switched to a tandem read with the ebook and gave it my full attention I had a much better experience. Based on the title and subtitle, I thought the author would be surveying a range of people on their reasons to read and was confused when it started with the author's own early experiences with reading [among other reasons, growing up hard of hearing, books were less frustrating than other experiences] ...and continued to be about her experiences. True, based on her career, she's had the opportunity to interact with many readers, whole classrooms full of them, but it's a lot more fun to engage with this essay collection when you recognize it as part memoir, part English teacher/writer's observations in the reasons she has discovered and observed that herself and other people may read. Overall, it's a well-written, often humourous, subjective look at the many benefits of reading, and the many reasons people may pick up a book that one might categorize as outside the standard 'for the pure love of reading'. There are interstitials such as 'signs you may be a female character in a work of historical fiction' that gently poke fun, but mostly this is the work of a broad-minded individual who can see value in all kinds of books and all kinds of reading, all the more so for having the experience of feedback from students, and fellow scholars. ♥️
⚠️mention of ableism, racism
