Why to read?

When you have had the pleasure of reading many books, and many books from the same author, you know what to expect, you can feel and "predict" how the plot is going to unfold... surely you can tell "the heroe will not die like this", "he will reach his goal", "they will find eachother again"...

With all logic, sense and sensibility, you know... So it is a huge prowess when despite that knowledge born from experience, the authors writing still inspire those wretched and marvelous feelings of worry, stress, longing, sadness, despair... It is quite an accomplishment, because it divides the mind from the heart: the mind knows, but despite that, the heart feels.

And in the end, when good, luck and fortune prevails, those wretched feelings morph into the deepest joy and hapiness... And in most cases, for many readers (if not for all) it is the only way to experience such bliss, because the feeling resultant from escaping death, finding true love, rescuing someone you love, saving the world, and defeating evil, are not part of our every day lifes.

That moment when you feel you can't breath one more time without knowing what is going to happen next, and you think there are just too many words in one single page, you want to put the book down, but you can't, so you read faster, and faster until there! absolution! redemption! undiluted bliss...

That is what a good book can accomplish: to divide mind from heart, feed the soul, and to take you on a journey beyond time, situation, and reality. It is a gift anyone can have, one is never too old to dream, too old to love a story... Not as long the heart is beating and the yearning to broaden the horizon of dreams has survived adulthood.