Sharing What We Read

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Has anyone else read Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell? Blink was a book I'd heard of in my qualitative evaluation class in grad school and that I put on my birthday suggestions list later on that year. I got it from Jeff as a gift and read it in a couple of days while using blessed public transportation to get to work outside Washington, D.C. 

I bring up this book to illustrate this point: we weren't reading Blink as part of our coursework, but our professor shared some of the book with us because it fit in well with our discussion about evaluation. The key word here is that he shared. Since reading Blink I've also read The Tipping Point and Outliers, all by Gladwell. I do not think I would have been as compelled to read any of these three books without my professor's recommendation of Blink based on how it related to my evaluation course. They have been terribly popular books, to be sure, but I do not only read books because they are popular (off-topic: I've still never read anything from the vampire romance genre). A good discussion sharing what we've recently read goes a long way, even if the discussion doesn't involve a recommendation. This is not to say that I love everything about Gladwell's books. Even with all his examples I wasn't sure I totally agreed with his theses in each book. And that's fine. I can't recall how glowing of a recommendation my professor gave for Blink, but I appreciated that he took the time to have a discussion with our class about something he found interesting and which was not required reading. It piqued my interest, and I sought to read the same book. This is only one example of when I have followed through on reading a book after someone talked with me about it.

In response to a shameless mass e-mail I sent out begging asking for guest posts for this little blog series, I received this note from my graduate committee chair, Dr. David Williams. I had wanted to write something about this very subject but wasn't sure how I would approach it. I got his e-mail last week and he hit the nail on the head. (I should point out that he is the aforementioned professor.)

In my own experience, I have parents who love to read and who have inspired me at different phases of my life to read things I didn't have to read for school or work. Then my wife and I got into a reading group that has done the same thing for over 20 years. We've enjoyed the social dimension of reading a book so we could talk about it with thoughtful people. I find that our grandchildren like to talk about what they are reading too. I guess your blog is another indication of this human tendency- it is great to snuggle down and read but its also very rewarding to discuss what we've read with others. 

So there you have it - we love discussing what we read, and we love reading what we discuss.  And what an awesome idea to have a reading group not just of women (the only kind I've ever been a part of), but of friends and couples and neighbors!

Share what you read - tell your mom about it when you call home on Sunday, post it on your Facebook wall, keep track of what you read on your blog, tell your spouse or best friend or significant other what you read when you see them next, talk to your kids or your nieces and nephews about what you're reading, and so on and so forth. And be sure you're listening when others share with you!