Whatcha Readin' For?

Books are Back, Baby!

I’ve always been a reader. I honestly cannot think of a time when I wasn’t reading something. My current book tracking app (more on that in a moment) says my reading streak is 9 days. Bitch, my streak is 51 years (by my rules, if you miss a day because you’re unconscious in the hospital because your gall bladder popped like a hotdog in the microwave, it doesn’t count).

I come by it honestly. My mother read more than I can adequately describe. The house was filled with bookshelves, and the bookshelves were stuffed with books. That didn’t stop us from going to the library - or the Bookmobile! - weekly. I have such fond memories of being turned loose in the stacks at Penrose Library in Colorado Springs. I can still feel the carpet and smell that smell.

Upstairs was the children’s section, but I bounced out of there pretty early on. I would wander and pull books off the shelf and gaze at the covers and always go home with a big old pile, which I’d devour alongside my mom and sister. Then we’d do it all over again.

My mother passed away a couple of years ago. Her last words to me were “Keep reading.”

Booktok? Booktube? Who Are You People?

I have never been in a book club. I think I would like to be. There are any number in my town. But - and I don’t know how to say this without sounding like a chud, so please know I try hard to not be one - those book clubs are just like, all chicks, man. They are women’s space. Part of me would feel weird, like I’m invading, and part of me would feel annoyed, because the books they read are, well, not my kind of books. Apparently there’s a thing called “Romantasy” now, and everything is cozy.

There is also a science fiction book club in town, I believe, which held some promise until I asked the organizer if they’d share details about books and location somewhere other than Facebook, and got a surprisingly firm no on that. If I wanted to, I think I could probably just hang around the local brewery and wait for the guys in anime shirts to show up, but I can take a hint.

I’ve thought about starting my own book club. Pick the kind of books I like, find the people who like them, too, but it seems daunting. How do I advertise it without sounding either smug or, again, chud-like? Book Bros! Come read books by dudes! But not the ones the manosphere is into, I swear! Like Jim Harrison and stuff! Bring snacks!

Alas, it’s not meant to be. So I’ve turned to the internet, and boy oh boy, that’s not great, either.

Goodreads is obviously out - it’s Amazonian and mostly there to sell crummy books to promiscuous readers. Storygraph strikes me as very millennial in a way I can’t quite verbalize. In fact, almost everything I’ve tried is good for reviewing books, but not so great at discussing them. And I’ll tell you, friends, my Buddhist commitment to the middle way is sorely tested when I see my literary heroes getting 0-star reviews from users who otherwise only seem to read books whose covers feature sweaty torsos.

I’ve found two decent apps, though, for the record. Pagebound has figured out how to encourage discussion and not just reviews (though I’m still having a hard time finding my people; but that’s not their fault). Bookmory goes the other way and just lets you track what you read with no social features whatsoever with a real sexy UI.

I have found a couple of interesting YouTube channels that discuss books, but those feel like a trap. I keep catching myself watching a guy talking about reading instead of, you know, just reading. I don’t need to be convinced to read more. I don’t need to know that other people don’t read enough. And yeah, I’ll admit that there’s a strain of video where they complain about the same stuff I’m complaining about, and it’s real tempting to go in hard on those, but they are also distressingly chud-adjacent and my algorithm gets real Tatey real quick, so I need to buck up and walk away.

Maybe I Don’t Even Want to Talk About Books

Somehow I am very well educated, despite going to public school and attending a college that is now defunct. I lucked into some serious teachers who taught me how to engage with books in a serious manner. I was taught to analyze what I read critically, and how to appreciate technique, and that some prose is better than other prose. Some books are better than others, and it’s okay to make a case as to why.

All of which is to say - I wish I saw more of that online.

Instead, what I see is weird parasocial attachment to characters and performative intersectional declarations. Everybody talks about plot (but in this weird way where the author “does” stuff to characters); nobody talks about language, or rhythm, or choice.

Maybe books are too personal for me. Maybe I don’t really want to talk about the books. Maybe I just want to meet the kind of people who read the same ones I do. Not a book club as much as a people-who-like-books club.

Because I do think books are back, and I think they’re the answer to a lot of our modern problems. Doomscrolling too much? Can’t stop bingeing shows? The algorithm got you? Losing the ability to tell what’s AI and what’s not? Pick up a god damn book, turn off your god damn phone, and save your god damn life.

Even, I guess, torso-based, plot-driven, sex-with-a-side-of-dragon type books. But meet me halfway and try Cannery Row, okay?