Take Heart, Fellow Readers (and Book Lovers)

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book.jpgAs avid readers (and sellers!) of books, a recent report from The National Endowment for the Arts was enough to gladden the hearts of all of us here at Village Books. According to the NEA, an exciting new trend is afoot. For the first time in more than 25 years, the number of people reading fiction is on the rise!! Could this be a response to the darkening news of economic uncertainty? Perhaps, for reading is an incredibly inexpensive source of entertainment. For about the same price as a movie ticket, a book provides days or even weeks of escape while a movie only lasts a few hours. But surprisingly, the category that showed the greatest increase in reading was the 18-to-24-year-old demographic, presumably not those of us worrying about paying the bills. According to Ann Patchett, author of seven novels including Bel Canto and most recently Run, "This is the first crop of newly minted adults who were raised up on Harry Potter novels. They came of age attending midnight release parties at their local bookstores and then faking mysterious illnesses the next day for the absolute necessity of staying in bed to read." (As hosts of those midnight parties, we would add to Harry Potter the more recent Eclipse phenomenon that has caused Stephenie Meyers' series to practically evaporate from our shelves!) Whatever the reason, we celebrate the trend, hope it continues and offer these suggestions for doing your part to make it so.
  • Read a book, and another and then another. 
  • Read to your kids. Read WITH your kids.
  • Read at Starbucks, or in line at the grocery store, or in a waiting room. 
  • Join a book club, or start a book club. 
  • Give a book as a gift. Write something personal on the inside cover. 
  • Give inexpensive books as party favors. 
  • Have a party and ask each person to bring their favorite book (wrapped) then play the "open and steal" game. 
  • Come to an author talk at Village Books - and bring a friend. 
  • Recommend the books you like, even to strangers. 
  • Keep a list of the books you've loved (because maybe, like us, you can't always remember their names?) 
  • Keep a list of books you want to read. Or come by the bookstore and let us recommend a few. It's what we love most to do.

Whatever you do,  celebrate with us the written word and all it offers. Happy New Year from all your friends at Village Books!!