If you'd like to learn how to read...

How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster is a riot...

well, maybe just for English nerds. Foster brilliantly uses his expertise in teaching college literature to compile chapter after hilarious chapter of practical reading advice.

The book is divided into sections, such as "Every Trip is a Quest (except when it's not)" and "Nice to eat you: Acts of Vampires," that take critical themes and writing devices in literature, explain why and how they are used and give the reader examples designed to help them learn how to look for them on their own. Far from pretentious or pompous, it is written in a tone that makes the reader feel like they are one of Foster's students, having a comfortable conversation in a book-and-paper strewn office.

One of the chapters I found especially helpful was "Now Where Have I Seen Her Before?". It defines "intertextuality"--the connections that are constantly being made between pieces of literature and poetry, the motifs of character and plot and symbolism being repeated over and over again. It explains that the more a reader reads, the more they understand about what they read because they will be able to recognize these things, and that this is true because writers do it too--they write what they know from what they've read. Sound confusing? It is! yet, Foster is able to divulge these literary secrets in a truly accessible way.

I have thoroughly enjoyed a leisurely pace through this book and look forward to reading his next book, published this year, entitled: How to read Novels like a Professor.