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Judging a Book by Its Lover

HarperCollins Publishers

Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Commercial Confessions

I'm a very anxious person. My guess (gathered from an unscientific survey of fellow readers and the uneducated opinions of my family) is that this may be the result of years of overexposure to fictional worlds and underexposure to real world activities such as recess, school dances, and cocktail parties. I'm not very comfortable in settings and situations most people take for granted as part of the comings and goings of everyday life. For example, traveling: traveling with me is an experience I wouldn't want to wish on anyone— and I go to great lengths to save friends and family the trouble. Accompanying me on planes and in cars is nightmarish. If it weren't for the helpful tricks that I've come to rely on, I don't know how I'd get anywhere. I've developed ways to deal with my anxiety, tics that keep the pressure down and keep the terror at bay. These quirks are my dirty little secrets. Sometimes it's just two stiff drinks at the airport TGIF before boarding; other times the situation calls for more drastic actions to divert my attention from my mounting anxiety over the prospect of hurtling forward on a road or through the sky. I need something a little more potent.

I'm telling you this because I want to be as honest as possible with you. Janet Evanovich books are my booze; I can't board a plane without checking the airport bookstore to find the newest tale of Stephanie Plum. If I've read all the available Evanovich, I have to pick the next easiest, sleaziest thing. I started and finished Twilight on red-eye trips from Detroit to Los Angeles and back; I conquered New Moon before touch down from New York to San Francisco. I wept over Idaho while reading the first Hunger Games. At these moments I need my reading easy and quick; I need to turn the pages without knowing it. I don't have the bandwidth to wonder about the underlying meaning of the exact word chosen to phrase how one turned around or analyze just why an object was described in a certain way. I need distraction, not deep thoughts.

I make this distinction because most of this book is about avoiding bad books, and I don't want a reader to think I'm being an elitist snob. Considering yourself a serious reader doesn't mean you can't read light books. Loving to read means you sometimes like to turn your head off. Reading is not about being able to recite passages from Camus by memory. Loving young adult novels well past adolescence isn't a sign of stunted maturity or intelligence. The most important thing about reading is not the level of sophistication of the books on your shelf. There is no prerequisite reading regimen for being a bookworm.

Let's all embrace the fact that The Da Vinci Code has sold more copies than all of Saul Bellow's works combined. Dan Brown and his ilk are keeping our bookstores in semi-business. If America chooses easy escapism over dense dialogue, we should welcome that decision with equanimity.

When it comes to reading, whatever floats the boat. And if someone deems your reading choice frivolous, who cares? If it's what you want to read, go for it.
(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Judging a Book by Its Lover by Lauren Leto. Copyright © 2012 by Lauren Leto. Excerpted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers.
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