The Idea is simple: read, review, report.
Why? You may ask. Well, I want to be an author. Part of being a writer means reading -- and it means exploring different genres, styles, and tastes. Sure, I could just read books without reporting but I see this as a unique opportunity to connect with other readers, remember what I wrote, and, most importantly, reflect on what the book did or didn't do well.
I feel that reading is important. Books are, from an evolutionary standpoint, an anomaly. We evolved to be distracted by the minor things going on around us. If you think about this, it makes sense. A hunter-gatherer who got too caught up in picking berries wouldn't notice a big sabertooth tiger sneaking up behind him...Uh oh! So the fact that we can train our brains to sit down, relax, and immerse themselves in another world is pretty interesting to me. I also think it's neat that when we read we activate the same neural pathways we would use if we were actually doing the activity we were reading about.
Believe it or not, there are many different types of reading. Reading novels and short stories is very different than the type of reading you do for a newspaper, magazine, or internet article. That being said, reading novels and short stories in particular are key. Deep reading, the type of reading we do when we pick up a novel, has many benefits: it teaches us how to analyze, it creates connections between what we are reading and our own personal experience, and it provides our brains with some much needed (especially in today's information age) quiet time.
I hope that in reviewing the books that I'm reading you may be inspired to pick up a book yourself or that you join in on the conversation. Disagree with a review? Tell me why! I'd love to hear your feedback.
