Brerah

The Converted Reader- An Autobiography

I am a reader. I have not always been a reader. But I am not a reader in the sense that Doug is a reader. (Doug) Serven (the RUF campus minister at OU) has this list of books that he reads that makes you feel like you are a waste of time. I think that all he does is read.

I did not grow up reading at all. Even the books that I was required to read I really didn't read. I insted just peered through the Cliff Notes. Not only did I not read, I made up a book one time for a book report. And if that's not bad enough, I made a 100% on it. But the joke was on me when it came test time. I took the ACT (which is like the SAT) eleven times during high school. I wanted to get a full scholarship to OU, and I only needed a few points higher. I would score in the 98% percentile in Science, 98% in English, and 97% in Math, and 84% in reading.....so what would I do to try to get a better score? You guessed it, more science, English, and math problems and practice tests. I was a finance major at OU, and as you can imagine, we didn't have to read a whole lot, except for the classes that everyone had to take. But something happened my junior year of college. I read Chosen By God by R.C. Sproul. Then I read Putting Amazing Back Into Grace by Michael Horton, and before I knew it I was churning out books almost weekly. (Many of you can relate if you went through the 'Introduction to Calvinism/Reformed Theology' Stage). In preparation for the internship that I am currently doing with RUF, I had to read about 15 books, and now I read about 2 or 3 books each month. I still think my reading comprehension is a little lower than I would hope, but hopefully it's getting better.

But my question is this: when you want to jump into reading something for fun, where do you start? I always hear recommendations from people, but how do I know that I will like the book? Usually when I don't like a book, I don't finish it. Should I start with a novel, or a non-fiction or what? Let me know, I am interested to hear some input...

posted by corbs @ 3:28 PM