Bookish but not snobbish

Hello all, and welcome to my very first blog post EVER! I’ve put off starting a blog because I feel like I don’t have much to contribute in the bookish world; I love to read and have read voraciously all my life, but I am far from being classically “well-read.” I have never read The Iliad, or Proust, or Virginia Woolf. I have simply always read what interested me, which during my adolescence, was mainly middle-grade fiction and fantasy. Then, as an English major, most of my reading time was spent on survey material and busy work. Gross, right? So I’ve had to self-educate since graduating University, and I’ve always felt that I would be inadequate and undeserving of the title of English Major until I had built up an appropriate repertoire of capital-C Classics. Which, in all likelihood, will never feel achieved.

However, when I look past my own personal insecurity, I have to assume I’m not alone in this state of mind. After all, who has read Proust? In fact, how many people are actually intimidated by the stereotypical “literary mind” who has read every single item on every list of classics ever written? (I’m looking at you, Rory Gilmore.) How many people throw their hands in the air, giving up on any possibility of ever being well-read? It’s just not possible to be a true book lover unless you’re a genius, a huge nerd, or you have infinite free time, right?

Nope. I’m here to tell you that if you read, you are a capital-R Reader. You can hold your head high, and you don’t have to feel embarrassed when someone mentions an author or title you’ve never heard before. Keep chipping away at the infinite mountain of books in our known universe, just like we all do. And in the meantime, we can all feel authorized – and even welcomed – to (humbly) join in all the bookish discussions we want, from whatever current point of reference we do have.

That’s what this blog is going to be all about. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert. I just want to share my opinions and geekish enthusiasm for stories with the world, and hopefully someone out there will find my recommendations, synopses, and ideas helpful in their search for a bookish community.

That being said, here is the list of my current favorites! They are in no particular order and include classics, contemporary fiction, sci-fi, pop fiction, and young adult fantasy. More in-depth discussions will be forthcoming. Have you read any of these, and would they make it onto your top ten list?

1. East of Eden, John Steinbeck
2. Circe, Madeline Miller
3. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
4. The Harry Potter Series, J.K. Rowling (cheating, I know, but I can’t choose just one!)
5. American Gods, Neil Gaiman
6. Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn
7. Commonwealth, Ann Patchett
8. Artemis, Andy Weir
9. One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
10. Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine