Joe Queenan – Zezee with Books

One for the Books — Available on Amazon and at your local bookstore.

I totally enjoyed reading this one. Queenan is hilarious and very sarcastic. I chuckled so much while reading this book on the train that quite a few times a fellow passenger would inquire of what I was reading. This book is like a tribute to books. Queenan discusses his weird, bookish quirks and all the places that books have brought him and that he has brought them.

This is one for book-lovers. A wealth of bookish topics are discussed as Queenan recounts his experiences with books, such as how to read books, whether or not to write in them, e-readers, organizing books, and book clubs (the section on book clubs is one of the funniest parts).

I hope to re-read this book in the future when, I hope, I can understand all the literary references stated in it. Being quite young, I haven’t read as much as Queenan who has thus far read about 6,128 books in his lifetime. I do wonder if he really has read that many books or if he’s just throwing out a random number. Anyways, I have no idea of how many books I’ve read thus far in my life. I know it’s quite a lot since I have never went without a book or stopped reading them since the day I discovered books, which was pretty early in life since my mother was an English teacher, but I do hope to top that number.

I discovered this book on the Wall Street Journal‘s website where I read an excerpt of it. I love reading books on books and since it was hilarious, I dashed to Barnes & Noble to get a copy. Check out the excerpt here.

Quote from book: “A reading life, a friend once told me, is an adventure without maps where you meet unexpected soulmates along the way.”