The Great American Read

I recently heard about The Great American Read, a new, 8-episode series PBS has planned for next summer. The first episode is set to cover America's 100 favorite book and I'm looking forward to watching the show, if only to see what books are mentioned. Plus I'm always looking for new book recommendations.

I think we can all guess that the favorite book in episode 1 will be To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Let's not even try to pretend it won't be. And I could write a whole damned separate blog about the absurdity of this country choosing that book as a favorite set against the backdrop of the events that took place in Charlottesville, VA this past weekend and the subsequent "both sides are to blame" aftermath that I'm starting to hear, but I'll try to restrain myself.

Instead, the question I ask is this: why are we all so pretentious about our favorite book? You see it over and over again. When asked what book is their favorite, people will automatically say something like To Kill a Mockingbird or Pride and Prejudice or The Great Gatsby. And don't get me wrong, they're all great books. Well, ok, full disclosure? I have issues with To Kill a Mockingbird that only became stronger when Go Set A Watchman came out.  And if I'm being truly, 100% honest? Outside of a few truly fantastic lines, I didn't care for The Great Gatsby either. It just... it left me cold for reasons I've never been able to quite put my finger on.

And if we do all have to claim classics or literary fiction for favorite books, why not Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns, or The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood? Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe? Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan (warning - you will cry. A lot.)? There are so many fantastic books out there and it makes me so mad to see the same 4 or 5 mentioned all the time while the rest drift into obscurity or are dismissed as commercial trash.

That's not to say I don't love the classics or that I'm like a dedicated YA and chick lit reader. Great Expectations really is one of my favorites - really anything by Dickens is good. And I do love Jane Austen. I can get down with a heavy, serious, weighty book. The classics are classics for a reason, for the most part.

I just have a hard time believing that, in a country where so many people are addicted to celebrity culture and reality tv, where libraries are constantly struggling to get funding, and where something like a third of the population freely and unashamedly admits they haven't read a single book since finishing high school, the proclaimed favorite books are classics. Sure.

So I propose that we all start telling the truth. I'll start.

While I don't really have a favorite book, per se, I have read Jemima J by Jane Green more than 10 times. I love that book. It's simple and unrealistic and silly and I love the damned thing.

I've recommended Ernest Cline's Ready Player One more times than I can count and I've read it three times already myself. I think anyone who has even a slight memory of the 80s or who just likes that era of pop culture will adore it and that it's not to be missed.

I love anything Stephen King puts out (except for Gerald's Game and Rose Madder - those two were awful, sorry SK - I hated them and I'm not even going to link them here) even though he's technically a genre writer. I proudly proclaim here and now that he is the modern Charles Dickens.

My Legendary Girlfriend, by Mike Gayle is another chick lit (but with the twist that it's writtten by a guy!) fluff book that I'm not ashamed to call it a favorite. I read it in my first apartment while my life was still very much an unformed messy thing and I think that for that reason, it stuck with me.

I read Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn two times in a row in the space of one week and was obsessed with getting everyone I knew to read it afterwards. I would definitely count it as a favorite.

All of the Jack Reacher books by Lee Child are my favorites. They are the best books to devour on a rainy afternoon. Jack Reacher is a badass whose methods I would 100% condemn in reality but in book form? More please! Along the same lines: Nelson DeMille's John Corey books.

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon is problematic for various reasons, but I love it anyway. It's just a good book. Unburdened by the excessive detail and repetition of her later books, it's a really great romance and I would absolutely put it in my top ten.

I could go on, but I think I've made my point. A favorite book doesn't have to be serious. It doesn't have to be a classic, it doesn't have to impress. What it has to do is make you feel something - happy, sad, frustrated, anything. After all, isn't that how art is defined? I was always taught that art is anything that makes you feel something. Even if you hate it, if it provokes a feeling in you, it's art. And what are books but art?

I challenge all my readers to tell me your real favorite book. And if it is a classic, no shame in that. I mean, Pride and Prejudice really is a good book. And so are a lot of other really serious, important books. For instance, Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimimanda Ngozie Adichie is brilliant I truly hope to eventually see it gaining classic status. It made me cry and it sparked an interest in modern African history and I highly recommend it to all. The author also has a couple of amazing TED Talks out there that everyone should check out.

Just don't say a book is your favorite because you think your favorite has to be important. Say it's your favorite because it's the book you would want on a desert island or that you recommend to everyone you know.