A review by half_finished
How to Read Now by Elaine Castillo

funny informative reflective slow-paced

3.5

Overall I do think this book has merit and I can see why many people enjoy it. My biggest criticisms are:
  1. The book sometimes reads like an essay with a minimum word requirement.  
  2. The author likes to interject unnecessary commentary in the middle of the sentence. For instance: "I'll paraphrase the hackneyed quote by the equally hackneyed George Santayana (who was often a pretty piss-poor reader of the world himself, and who believed, for example, that intermarriage between superior races- his own- and inferior races-hi- should be prevented): if we don't figure out a different way to read our world, we'll be doomed to keep living in it. (Author's Note, Or A Virgo Clarifies Things, p. 10). Whenever I came across one of these sentences they often came off as all the weaker for the interruption- as if the only way that Castillo could make her point across was to hide it within the sentence. 
If you are white, then I would definitely recommend this to you, if you're a person of color, I'd read it if you are looking for a starting place to decolonize your reading.
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