The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction

Alan Jacobs offers an insightful, accessible, and playfully irreverent guide for aspiring readers. Each chapter focuses on one aspect of approaching literary fiction, poetry, or nonfiction, exploring everything from the invention of silent reading, to reading responsively, rereading, and reading on electronic devices. Invitingly written, with equal measures of wit and erudition, this book offers some simple, powerful, and much needed advice: read at whim, read what gives you delight, and do so without shame, whether it be Stephen King or the King James Version of the Bible.