On Lying

Wait, what? On lying? Lying about what? Well why don’t I just tell you? On lying about what you have and have not read. I saw another blogger post about this recently and then I read a few articles from major publications. There seems to be a number of people who lie about having read certain books.

I may be mistaken, but I think the survey was taken in England. And I also think the books people lie about reading are mostly classics.

This whole thing got me thinking. First, I see no point in saying I’ve read any book I haven’t. And second, which book(s) would I lie about reading? If I were such a person. Hmmmm. I think I’d lie about reading a book if I’d already seen the movie. But I can’t imagine lying about reading some classic I know nothing about. Imagine the conversation.

“Have you read Pride and Prejudice?”

“Yeah! It’s one of my favorites!”

“Oooh. Who’s your favorite character?”

*crickets*

And there’s really no reason to experience this. I know people talk about books they haven’t read, and that’s fine. But saying you’ve read something you haven’t is just weird. And dumb.

Have you ever told someone you’d read a book you actually hadn’t? Which book was it you little liar, you? 😂

Ten Facts About Books for World Book Day (a day late)

Yesterday was World Book Day. At least that’s what popped up all over my WordPress Reader. I also happened to see at least one person call it Erotic Book Day. We’ll just assume she was trying to bring attention to herself because that can’t really be a thing. I surely hope not.

Anyway, yesterday was World Book Day. And I have no idea what we were celebrating. Was it someone’s birthday from a few centuries ago? Or maybe the original publication date of one of the most known works in history? I have no clue. But surely there’s some reason March 5th is the date. So in honor of the momentous day, here are ten “facts” about books. They’re from the UK and the list isn’t mine.

1. The Average UK household owns 203 books.

2. The British Library contains about 14 million books and needs roughly six miles of new shelf space every year just to add new items.

3. UK publishers release about 184,000 new or revised books each year.

4. Since 2011, sales of eBooks in the UK have overtaken sales of print books.

5. Jane Austen originally gave the name First Impressions to her book that was later published as Pride and Prejudice.

6. France has won more Nobel Prizes for Literature than any other country.

7. J.R.R Tolkien is said to have typed the whole of the LOTR with only two fingers.

8. In 2014, the town of Tuszyn in Poland banned Winnie-the-Pooh.

9. A 2013 survey reported that 18 percent of people don’t read print books.

10. “There is no friend as a loyal as a book.” -Hemingway

I think I took these from a UK tabloid because it really reminds me of Elite Daily. BUT these don’t seem too outrageous to think they aren’t somewhat true. So eh, just read the list knowing that I have no means to verify the accuracy of any of these statements. Well I could verify a few, but what fun would that be?

Happy Belated World Book Day!

On this day in 2014 I published Stop Choosing Between Writing and Reading.