Reader of the Week: Mr. Hegarty

Reading means getting lost, wandering off, and dreaming, quietly thinking about things without distractions. Good with no socks or shoes and your feet up and a cup of tea. (I used to be able to read and listen to music, but that changed long ago.) I think I became a reader because all my older siblings were readers, and my cousins; I think all of us kids read, but not our parents (that’s odd?).

Right now I’m not reading much at all other than magazines (and that’s mostly just the old New Yorkers that have stacked up at home).

Over the last break, though, Mrs. Pankiewicz gave me Marcelo in the Real World (by Francisco X. Stork) which I found I really liked. She knew I had enjoyed The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time (by Mark Haddon) so passed "Marcelo" on to me. Good book.

My all-time-favorites have changed over the years – as a young boy it was The Hobbit (by JRR Tokien), and later, as a teenager, it was Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and everything by Hermann Hesse.

In my twenties I went on a Stephen King binge. In my thirties I discovered John Irving (all time favorite book for sure is A Prayer for Owen Meany) – and now in my forties I seem to read more non-fiction, most recent brilliant gem Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (by Doris Kearns Goodwin). Other great gems of the last few years include Never Let Me Go by Ishiguro, The Graveyard Book (by Neil Gaiman), and Reading in the Dark (by Seamus Deane).  And so many more . . .