Adventures in Reading

I've loved to read ever since I can remember. But when I was a kid, I dug some pretty deep ruts with my book choices: the Buttons books from the elementary school library, then Beezus and Ramona--all of them. Then every Nancy Drew mystery I could get my hands on; I even collected them just to make sure I didn't miss one. By 7th grade, I was all about teen romances. Then Gothic romances in high school. Not much variety in there--I pretty much stuck with a single genre, even a single author if I could get away with it.

College didn't leave much time for pleasure reading, but luckily I discovered a wide range of fabulous books after graduation. When I worked in Yellowstone Park, I became fascinated by the history and geology of the region and read accordingly. The Lewis and Clark journals, books about Park history and politics, plus assorted fiction.

One day I was mystified when the pilot I was flying with said he didn't like to read. At all. Not magazines, not newspapers, and certainly not books. Wow. Another pilot friend is an avid reader. We often exchange book lists and sometimes books. But he refuses to read fiction. I think he's really missing out. For one thing, I firmly believe that genuine fiction--completely made up stuff--is hard to come by. People write what they know, so every book has an element of truth to it. For more on this, study the debate around Wallace Stegner's Angle of Repose.

This happens to be one of my favorite all-time novels and it won the Pulitzer Prize. But portions of the book--some say too many portions--came directly from the journals of the thinly disguised main character.

I also think Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible is one of the greatest books ever written and it, too, is loosely based on real-life experiences. The Big Rock Candy Mountain is another Wallace Stegner fave and it's semi-autobiographical. Since I largely missed out on the classics when I was young (too busy reading Nancy Drew), I've been trying to catch up on those. A couple of favorites: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and The Grapes of Wrath. Although technically fictional, both offer realistic accounts of life during the Great Depression.

Now I'll read most anything I can get my hands on, although there are so many books that should be read in this lifetime it's hard to justify "bubble gum" books or things that just don't seem worthy. As much as I love book stores, they remind me that there are more good books than I can ever read--and more being published every day! Yesterday I made a rare book purchase (I usually borrow from the library or from friends): The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein and Kingsolver's latest, Lacuna. I hope they don't disappoint.