Reading Profile

Reading is integral to my childhood memories. I remember the musty aroma of the bookmobile on a humid summer day, the first book I checked out from the school library (How the Camel Got Its Hump), and the fantastic discovery of Michelin travel guides on the shelves on my public library which allowed me to plan all sorts of vicarious trips while still too young to drive. For as long as I can remember I've always had a large stack of books waiting to be read.

Freedom of reading choice disappeared in college, replaced with long reading lists for history and English classes. With 10-week terms cycling by quickly, there are a number of great books that passed before my eyes, but I can't say I truly read and experienced them.

Once freed from college reading lists, I read mostly non-fiction until I became a library staff member a few years ago and realized I needed to get reacquainted with a wide range of fiction very quickly.

The promise of interesting characters often draws me to a book and, if that promise is fulfilled, makes that title memorable. My last-read favorite book is A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman. While the plot points are interesting, what drew me to this title, kept me interested throughout, and made me sad to reach the end is the quirky characters and their interactions with one another.

Along with character, I'm also drawn to stories with a strong sense of place, especially if I can couple a book's setting with travel. Recently my son and I listened to Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods while driving across the country with a two-day deadline. Although we were heading west in a car rather than north on foot, being on our own trek while listening to the book enhanced our enjoyment and memory of the story. This year we shared The Martian audio book on our cross country drive and arrived home with 20 minutes left on the last disc. If it weren't for welcoming family members literally standing at the door to greet us, we would have, even after 16 hours in the vehicle that day, sat in the garage to finish the book. (Fortunately the others went to bed soon after and we finished listening that night.)

Beyond interesting, fully-drawn characters and strong settings, I tend to look first at realistic and literary fiction, and biographies. Work responsibilities push me toward YA titles, but again I gravitate toward realistic fiction (I loved Eleanor and Park) and am hopelessly out of step in the YA world as I do not enjoy dystopian or vampire tales. I also should read more mysteries and, what I term in my head "popular guy authors" -- James Patterson, Clive Cussler, Stuart Woods -- to be better able to make recommendations to our patrons.

Perhaps I'm still rebelling a bit against the rush to push through so many books in college. I don't set reading goals and only periodically update my Goodreads account to reflect which titles I've read. I do, however, keep lengthy "to read" lists on Goodreads, filled with any title I run across that sounds remotely interesting and separated out in a number of subcategories for reader's advisory reference. I'm looking forward to putting a small dent in my "to read" pile and pushing myself into some new genres through this course.