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How to read

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  Portrait of a Woman by the British artist Nina Hamnett, painted in 1917 . Thanks to my friend (and once colleague at Friends House Library) for pointing out this painting, which fits the theme of this blog so well.  My starting point this time is the various forms of reading material.  Our living room and landing are lined with bookshelves, and many, many books, most gathering dust.  But these days a lot of my reading is on an electronic device - not often a computer with keyboard, but some form of tablet.  My daily newspapers and other periodicals come on my iPad, downloading quickly each morning as I settle with my breakfast.  Most of the books I read are stored on my Kindle - light and easy to use. a mechanical multi-reader Traditional books, hardback and paperback, have a firm place in our lives and affections.  They are also vital not just when the power goes off (that includes forgetting to charge batteries), although without some form of light they are hard to read in the dark
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A new chapter

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  A recent and enjoyable read I've wanted to start this book blog for ages, and the period of summer heat is as good a time as any.  Other parts of my blog life focus on wine and music, and on our life since moving to France.  But there is a huge gap - I spend a lot of time reading, and this blog will focus on that, as well as on library work which has taken an increasing amount of time since 2021.   I trained as a librarian and worked in libraries for a while in my 20s.  Since then my paid work was always closely tied to information sharing, combining the parallel pleasures of making information more accessible and trying to understand and respond to people's need to know.  These days the growth of fake news, disinformation, flat denial and plain ignorance makes the question 'what is truth?' (biblical of course, but ageless) ever mor complex and important.   My day always starts and ends with reading.  First thing in the morning it is the daily newspapers, the local Mi
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