Dear Reader
Ratings6
Average rating4
“Reading has saved my life, again and again, and has held my hand through every difficult time.”
Cathy Rentzenbrink tells the story of her life through the books she read. Even during the hardest times, it was books that pulled her through.
At the end of each chapter is a list of recommended reads.
From being inspired to move to Paris by Flaubert's Parrot, to starting a book blog after reading How To Be A Woman, this gentle, cozy book reaffirmed for me the unique magic of a reader's life. Told as a kind of bookish memoir with topical recommendations at the end of each chapter, I ate this up rather quickly and was left with a desire to 1) read all the books!, 2) move to Cornwall, and 3) open up a bookshop. My one caveat is that the author's reading recommendations skewed pretty Anglo- and European-centric. Overall, it was an enjoyable book about books.
I've been a voracious reader all my life, so I am probably right in the target market for this amiable and chatty memoir of a life around books. Rentzenbrink mixes autobiography with easy conversation about her favourite books. Her family, especially her father, are well drawn and charming, and there are little nuggets of joy to be had when she alights on a book that you also love. It's a great comfort read, warm and inclusive, with no “oh, you haven't read Proust?” snobbery. My only real complaint is that it's too brief, I could have read twice as much again.