How To Buy a Love of Reading

About me:

Well, I'm a book that was published by Dutton on May 14, 2009. My official website is: www.howtobuyaloveofreading.com. (I'd love if you came to visit! You can read an excerpt there, poke around a virtual bookshelf, and even share YOUR story about how reading changed your life.) What else? Well, I'm blue. And as you might have concluded from the "Interests" section, I'm not always sure what's real and what's fiction. What am I about? A lot of things. But mostly, I'm about a girl who hates books. And who is in love with her best guy friend. Who loves books. The girl's parents decide to buy her "book-love" by hiring an author to write her the "book of her dreams." Except the girl doesn't have any dreams about books. Only about the guy. But the only thing the guy is ever dreaming about these days is eighty-proof scotch and size-zero girls. And the girl? She isn't exactly a zero...

"At last, a novel for those of us who love both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Emotions that rise to the level of myth, a heroine who faces a daunting challenge, a passion that surpasses self-interest or reason--they're all here, and so are ironic commentary, gorgeous prose, and an inspiring argument for the necessity of stories. Tanya Egan Gibson's remarkable debut proves her case: that stories have power, and that we cannot do without them in our ongoing struggle to excavate the secrets of the human heart."

- Leah Stewart, author of The Myth of You and Me

"Carley Wells, the protagonist of Tanya Egan Gibson's How To Buy a Love of Reading, is at once a sympathetic antihero and a much appreciated antidote to the cultural pretensions of Long Island's aristocracy. This is satire with a heart."

- Will Allison, author of What You Have Left

"How To Buy a Love of Reading is a wholly original and wonderful first novel about growing up in the strangest of worlds, and the incredible power of storytelling to make that world livable. In her lovely debut, Tanya Egan Gibson blends humor and sentiment in the most surprising of ways. The story she weaves is a joy from start to finish."

- Laura Dave, author of The Divorce Party and London is the Best City in America

"Ladies and gentleman, please welcome to the stage Tanya Egan Gibson, a fresh and funny new voice in the world of fiction. How To Buy a Love of Reading is an original and highly readable novel with a most unusual premise that should captivate anyone who loves to read."

- Mark Childress, author of Crazy in Alabama and One Mississippi

"What a page-turner! Gibson lovingly skewers two self-obsessed classes: the upper crust and the literary, propelled by razor-sharp wit. I'd say you can buy a love of reading yourself, very easily, right now."

- Glen David Gold, author of Carter Beats the Devil and Sunnyside