If reading is good, reading more must be better.
I know and please forgive me for another article about making it a resolution to read more, and coming from a library employee surely seems heavy handed. Biased much? Then to top it off, we are nearly two weeks into the new year. Perhaps I will work on procrastination next year? I hear it is never too late for self-improvement.
In any event, please bear with me the cliches and peruse these compelling books about the value of reading. The Library is here to enrich lives in our community, and few resolutions work toward that goal as meaningfully as reading.
"Why Read?" by Mark Edmundson.
In this important book, acclaimed author Mark Edmundson reconceives the value and promise of reading. He enjoins educators to stop offering up literature as facile entertainment and instead teach students to read in a way that can change their lives for the better.
"Why Read Moby-Dick?" by Nathaniel Philbrick.
Moby-Dick is perhaps the greatest of the Great American Novels, yet its length and esoteric subject matter create an aura of difficulty that too often keeps readers at bay. Fortunately, one unabashed fan wants passionately to give Melville's masterpiece the broad contemporary audience it deserves.
"The Read-Aloud Handbook," by Jim Trelease.
"The Read-Aloud Handbook" imparts the benefits, rewards, and importance of reading aloud to children of a new generation. Supported by delightful anecdotes as well as the latest research, The Read-Aloud Handbook offers proven techniques and strategies—and the reasoning behind them—for helping children discover the pleasures of reading and setting them on the road to becoming lifelong readers.
"The Happiness Project," by Gretchen Rubin.
In this lively and compelling account, Rubin chronicles her adventures during the twelve months she spent test-driving the wisdom of the ages, current scientific research, and lessons from popular culture about how to be happier. Among other things, she found that novelty and challenge are powerful sources of happiness; that money can help buy happiness, when spent wisely; that outer order contributes to inner calm; and that the very smallest of changes can make the biggest difference.
"Why I Read: The Serious Pleasure of Books," by Wendy Lesser.
Here the reader will discover a definition of literature that is as broad as it is broad-minded. In addition to novels and stories, Lesser explores plays, poems, and essays along with mysteries, science fiction, and memoirs. As she examines these works from such perspectives as "Character and Plot," "Novelty," "Grandeur and Intimacy," and "Authority," Why I Read sparks an overwhelming desire to put aside quotidian tasks in favor of reading.
"A Truth Universally Acknowledged: 33 Great Writers on Why We Read Jane Austen," edited by Susannah Carson.
Why are we so fascinated with Jane Austen’s novels? Why is Austen so universally beloved? The essayists in this volume offer their thoughts on the delightful puzzle of Austen’s popularity. Classic and contemporary writers—novelists, essayists, journalists, scholars, and a filmmaker—discuss the tricks and treasures of Austen’s novels, from her witty dialogue, to the arc and sweep of her story lines, to her prescriptions for life and love.
"How to Read and Why," by Harold Bloom.
Successively exploring the short story, poetry, the novel and drama, Bloom illuminates both the how and why of his title and points us in all the right directions.
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