I’d Rather Be Reading, Guinevere de la Mare 2017
A charming and thoroughly delightful little book about the love of reading. De la Mare is the founder of The Silent Book Club (https://silentbook.club/) which has more than 50 chapters around the world and is a book club where you choose your own book and silently enjoy it. There are no formal meetings or other requirements and the site provides instructions on organizing your own chapter (a new one was evidently just formed in Serbia!) as well as fun adjuncts to support your hobby, e.g. pins, vases, postcards (!), and other paraphernalia which refer to reading. Embracing reading is what this book does, and does it beautifully. Featuring essays by de la Mare, Ann Patchett, and several others, there are abundant photos and prints revolving around books and the world that surrounds them. My favorite painter of books, Jane Mount, has a page featuring Shakespeare’s plays, and one of my favorite photographs shows a vase of flowers, a glass of wine, and a coaster upon which is printed “Read, Wine, Repeat”. Excellent advice to live by. This book makes a great gift for a reading friend.
