Getting Someone Hooked On Reading

A co-worker recently asked me to recommend some books for her. She's planning to go back to school, the only reading under her belt is high school must reads, and she wants to start reading to get into the habit for when she takes some college courses. I was sort of flattered but didn't have the heart to tell her that the books I read are hardly college-bound material but there was no way I was going to avoid the chance to turn someone on to reading for pleasure.

So, doesn't my mind turn completely blank when I'm trying to make a mental list of authors for her! I wanted to give her a broader view of what I like to read, a real cross-section of genres so she wouldn't be turned off by one particular author or one particular sub-genre. I didn't recommend any historical romances or categories, especially not cats because they've been given a bad rap through the years, been given names like "trailer-park porn", "sappy" or the most common (and stupidest of them all) "bodice-rippers" (this is SOOOO old it shows you how out of touch the denigraters are). But I digress - this tangent could be a post in itself.

Some of the books/authors I recommended are Nancy Bush's "Jane Kelly" mysteries (think of a PNW Stephanie Plum-type kick-ass heroine who is even more likeable); any of the Sandra Brown, Nora Roberts or Susan E. Phillips single titles; some guilty pleasures are Patterson's women's murder club books so I recommended she read those in order; as well as the Plum books in numerical order. I listed Tess Gerritsen but blood/guts/gore aren't everyone's cup of tea so I recommended she be prepared. Also Kristin Hannah, Susan Wiggs, John Sandford, and Philip Margolin.

While I didn't recommend the series romances per se, I did recommend a few of my favorite authors that she could find at the local library. So many authors and sub-genres to choose from but I didn't want to overwhelm her with quantity (or my enthusiam). As it stands now, I'll never know what she ends up liking or not liking as she'll be leaving us and taking up a new position in one of our other offices starting January 5th. We'll still be in touch via inter-office e-mail or phone but maybe it's better not knowing - this way I can hope I've turned her on to reading in some small way, and maybe she'll have a favorable view of romances if she decides to try some. I'll be rooting for her.