Sometimes I’m more fascinated by how a book made it to me than what I learn in reading that book. Most people read Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee in college, but I found it in The Sentence by Louise Erdrich. Tookie, the main character, works at a…

Last year’s reading project was to re-read classics I had read in my twenties. I failed. I made several attempts, but once I finished The House on Mango Street, the memories flooded back. realized my twenties were not a time I wanted to relive, and the project kept getting postponed, stacked on my bedside table.…

Last summer I read two books I couldn’t put down: Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I loved the first one and finishing the second one became a chore, but what happened after…

Before I start a book, I try to commit to something significant: a prologue, a chapter. If I’m feeling particularly leisurely, I’ll set aside an hour and read 50 pages, knowing that, once I’ve read them, I’ll be able to make a decision as to whether…