The Why

It's a cliche.  I know it, but I embrace it proudly:  I believe in the power of reading.  Those much more articulate than I have extolled the joy of literature and the miracle of both losing and finding yourself in a great book. Reading has comforted me, buoyed me, amused me, provoked, delighted, and enlightened me.  Reading is how I like to begin and end my day.  I imagine it is how I began and will end my life.  It is one of my few long-term commitments.

I teach students who do not believe in the power of reading.  My amazing students, who are bright and enthusiastic and funny and complicated and hurting and healing and thoughtful and impulsive, have either lost or never found the joy of recognizing themselves in the pages of a book.  Often their literary encounters are awkward or forced, more about what adults think they should be reading than about what they would choose for themselves.  Too often the books they encounter in my curriculum are the literary equivalent of a series of terrible first dates.

If I'm going to be a better matchmaker, lead my students to their own literary bashert, I realized I needed a lot more books in my network.  And like any good matchmaker, I needed a large variety of types to recommend to my students -- including books that I might not choose for myself. So I decided to make a commitment to some serious reading this summer.

In a moment of reckless optimism, I declared to my husband that I was going to read a book a day during summer break.  He laughed aloud; I always appreciate his honesty.  So I have scaled back my goal to 42 books, about one every other day.  (The fact that it echoed the title of a movie about a boy discovering who he is by falling in love is just a bonus.) I'll be writing about the novels, as I have decided that I'll be reading fiction this year, on this blog.  The books will be focused on reading levels from about third grade to about seventh, as those are the ranges in my classroom.  Some students may be able to read at a higher level than that, but I also want to recommend books that are appropriate to their emotional developmental as well.

I have a very loose list, but I'll be looking for suggestions.  Please let me know what your thoughts are on what I should read next, or let me know if I've missed something in my discussion of the novels. Thanks for checking in.