The Real Reason I Read

Last Friday, I was on the last leg of a 400 mile round trip when I disappeared into my past. It was a song that did it. Charlie Daniels’ Devil Went Down To Georgia. When I was 10, I went camping in the Smokey Mountains with my best friend Kitty, and her parents. Her Mom absolutely loved this song and we thought it was great because it had a swear word in it.

Nearly 30 years later, the swear word is gone, but the song still captivates. Not because I like it per say. But because it has the power to transport me to another place and time. Cruising along the highway mid-afternoon, exhausted (I started this round trip at 3 AM) and utterly overwhelmed by a burden I cannot escape, I happened across this song just as it was starting. Without thinking, I turned the radio up full blast and let myself not only hear, but feel the song. It took me back to the giggling kid I was, the long hours on the highway traveling from Michigan to Tennessee, bathing in a mountain creek cold enough to chill wine, peering out of our tent waiting for bear each night, the skunk that walked right into our campsite during dinner, more giggling in the back of the van as we hit the road again, and more.

For the duration of that song, I didn’t have a care in the world. For lack of a better way to describe it, it was a sensory experience. I FELT it. Was MOVED by it. It was BIGGER than me. BIGGER than any problem I have. It was, in a word, ESCAPE.

We all know that books carry this power as well. The brief euphoria I experienced near mile marker 188 served to remind me that this is why I read. I read and appreciate authors—artists in my mind—because of their power to affect my senses. That is the sole criteria by which I (should) judge a story. And going forward, I’ll try to remember that.

Regardless of author personality, controversy, book cover, publisher reputation, genre warts—regardless of every other thing, I will continue to remind myself that it is all about the work. It is all about the book and its power to move me, to change the way I think or feel and, in some moments, to provide brief respite from my present circumstances.

I will also try to remember to include a word of thanks in my book reviews. For that is what I am. Thankful. Every time a book, or song, takes me on a journey.