I came to reading relatively late in life. As a child, I loved browsing the family bookcase, with Newnes Family Encyclopædia, Pears Cyclopædia, The Wonderful World of Nature, and other such worthy tomes, but I don't recall reading an entire book until I borrowed Lemon Kelly and the Home Made Boy from the library when I was around 10. Thereafter, I was a sporadic and infrequent reader, and could probably count on the fingers of three hands the number of books I read in the next decade or so. My wife, on the other hand has always loved reading, becoming utterly absorbed in various lives and adventures from an early age. I slowly started the reading habit only once I was well and truly old enough to know better (probably after I had developed the habit of routine sobriety), but initially it was through picking up books that my wife was reading, and delving into them occasionally. In this way, I read a few of the Earth's Children series, beginning with Clan of the Cave Bear. However, I did not make it all the way to the end, unlike she-who-must-be-obeyed, who waited patiently for the recent release of the final book in the series, The Land of Painted Caves.
I have not read Lord of the Rings, Catcher in the Rye, The Picture of Dorian Gray, or countless other works that I really ought to. I have read Catch 22, some le Carré, a little SF, and odd thriller/espionage titles that catch my eye, usually lurking on charity shop shelves. What I have found increasingly absorbing is biography, with First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong being a recent favourite (even if it was rather exhausting).
I have left a few books unfinished—some intentionally, others not—and have an increasing pile 'on the go', which I shall definitely work through in the not-too-distant future. This stack includes The God Delusion, Life: An Unauthorised Biography, and a collection of Ian Rankin's short stories, Beggars Banquet. The current bedtime favourite is A Beautiful Mind, the biography of genius mathematician John Nash, from which was produced the film of the same name. Like First Man, it is a substantial work, and equally compelling. I can't begin to understand the variety of maths that Nash and his colleagues worked on, but as a portrait of a man suffering a catastrophic loss of his mental faculties, it is a very human story that manages to bewilder, amuse, and inspire. It will probably take me at least another month of bedtimes to complete. Once that is out of the way, I shall pick up another biography, that of Keith Richards, Life. I am determined to resist the temptation to leave yet another book unfinished before starting upon it. But now, enough writing: I have a date with a wacky number-cruncher.
I have not read Lord of the Rings, Catcher in the Rye, The Picture of Dorian Gray, or countless other works that I really ought to. I have read Catch 22, some le Carré, a little SF, and odd thriller/espionage titles that catch my eye, usually lurking on charity shop shelves. What I have found increasingly absorbing is biography, with First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong being a recent favourite (even if it was rather exhausting).
I have left a few books unfinished—some intentionally, others not—and have an increasing pile 'on the go', which I shall definitely work through in the not-too-distant future. This stack includes The God Delusion, Life: An Unauthorised Biography, and a collection of Ian Rankin's short stories, Beggars Banquet. The current bedtime favourite is A Beautiful Mind, the biography of genius mathematician John Nash, from which was produced the film of the same name. Like First Man, it is a substantial work, and equally compelling. I can't begin to understand the variety of maths that Nash and his colleagues worked on, but as a portrait of a man suffering a catastrophic loss of his mental faculties, it is a very human story that manages to bewilder, amuse, and inspire. It will probably take me at least another month of bedtimes to complete. Once that is out of the way, I shall pick up another biography, that of Keith Richards, Life. I am determined to resist the temptation to leave yet another book unfinished before starting upon it. But now, enough writing: I have a date with a wacky number-cruncher.
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