I just finished this book called The Blood of the Fold.
Well, actually, I had already read it, so I guess you can say I re-finished it. Anyway, the author is Terry Goodkind. It’s not a wildly original tale, nor is the writing brilliant and the theme fresh, but it is a good read, and by good I mean engaging and fluid and full of adventure and blunt humor. Characters with inhuman strength and human weakness sail into your heart, and you feel compelled to finish the book (even though you may find the story a little droll in places) just to witness the end of their struggles.
I’ve always been an avid reader. Books are my friends in a way that none of my “real” friends can fathom. I’ve read through a variety of genres and authors, including works such as Ender’s Game, The Giver, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Sherlock Holmes, 1984, and The Other Boleyn Girl.
The professor of my English class last semester had us read several articles per week by many distinguished authors in the field of journalism. Now because I’m accustomed to giving my time to this pursuit that stimulates little action and much brain power, I had no trouble treating each article as a kind of short story. However, the objective had changed from one of entertainment to education.These authors had something pertinent to contribute to the rhetorical world at that immediate point in time ( not to say novelists don’t, only that journalists make it obvious). Writers like George Saunders, Joann Beard, and Ian Frazier (if you don’t know who these people are, not to worry. I had no idea myself until taking ENGL215, which I highly recommend) task themselves to grab your attention, teach you to understand and appreciate their language, and ultimately unravel their words to form an understanding of your own.
To me, each essay was a puzzle. I had to find the patterns, forge connections, grasp allusions, but I learned how to read. I mean How To Read, not how to read. How to comprehensively soak in information, mull it around, interpret it, and then write about your reaction to it (for you grammatical Nazis out there, I am aware that the previous sentence is not a complete sentence. One thing you learn from reading professionals is that if you can bend or break the rules with stealth and precision, you gain power).
From a little girl who loved her old friends, her books, to a college student looking for her English minor credits, one thing has changed; oh, I still love to read. However, I am beginning to learn how to love to write about what I read. I hope you will learn to love to read what I love to write about. (preposition!) (you can’t end with a preposition!)
You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend. ~Paul Sweeney
