Bookish: A Love Letter to Reading
Lucy Mangan’s Bookworm , about the joys of children’s literature, was a little overwhelming. That’s not a criticism; rather, she wrote in such detail about all the books she’d read as a child that my mind reeled at the detail she dived into. She seemed to have read every book written for children – in English – ever! And while I’d read a lot of them, I hadn’t read nearly as many as her – probably about a quarter actually - so had no frame of reference for most of her comments. (It did introduce me to Gwen Grant’s Private – Keep Out though, and for that I’ll be grateful for the rest of my days.) Bookish is – well, for me at least – far more accessible. Mainly because I’ve read just about all the books she writes about and so can involve myself more deeply in her thoughts and judgements. And it’s pure pleasure to discover them. She takes in everything from early YA, to set texts at school, to an English Lit degree at Cambridge, bonkbusters and bestsellers… Lucy Mangan li...
