The Best Five Books To Share With Your Friends

by Glen Weldon
Those of us who are forever pushing books onto friends harbor few illusions about the practice. We know we may never get the books back and that, if we do, they'll bear scars of their journey — rings of dried coffee on the frontispiece, a spine so badly cracked it cries out for orthopedic surgery. But that's fine. We inveterate book-lenders are not collectors. And while we value the solitary experience of reading, we relish the act of passing a book along, of becoming a vector for the author's language, characters, imagery and arguments.


Below, a short list of books I've pressed into other people's hands over the past year. On the surface, they've got little in common. Obsession figures largely in several — and meteors, too, weirdly enough. But the thing that truly unites these books is the urge they spark to send them out into the world so that they might sink their hooks into someone else. Of course, this is the season of giving, not lending, so even if you haven't devoured these books yourself, know that any of them would make a fine gift. But be prepared: In a week or two, the recipient might just show up at your doorstep breathless, eyes blazing: "Man, you gotta read this thing."
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