The Pleasures of Reading

Following up on her critically acclaimed ^IReading Matters^R, Catherine Ross takes a new look at pleasure reading through some 60 alphabetically arranged essays, based on themes from A to Z. In short pithy chapters, she discusses issues from Appeals and the Art of Reading to Harry Potter, Oprah, and Zeitgeist. Drawing on her own research, past and present, as well as other published sources, Ross comments on the significance of each theme, provides examples of the phenomenon, and develops the topic chronologically, through further examples, or through reversals. ^LThe essays are unified by an underlying theory of reading, which is a view of readers as sense-makers, actively engaged in reading themselves into the text and reading the texts back into their own lives. It gives educators and librarians insights into their roles with readers, and offers a message about the importance of pleasure reading.^LFor each topic, a short list of resources for further reading will be given.