Dad’s pretty smart: two masters degrees,  virtual assassin in Words With Friends/Scrabble, and former engineer.  Unlike the three women in his life, he’s not a voracious reader.  He’s most likely to read something in which a government agent gets involved with a conspiracy theory and teams up with a smart and cute specialist to take down bureaucratic evil.  He does read this blog, however, and he recently commented that he wanted to read one book from each of my shelves from  my office reorganization project.  Dad’s life goal was to visit all of the continents. Now that he’s finished, his new goal is to visit all of my bookshelves. I’m flattered.

I’ve done the math: with my two big office bookcases and a couple of others in my apartment, I have 17 total shelves. (I know, Dad, I originally said 14 but that was just an estimate and I was wrong.)  So I have 17 opportunities to share my favorite books with my Dad.

Some shelves will be harder than others; I’m particularly thinking of my princess themed shelf. I just don’t know that Dad will appreciate Princess Mia.  My goal is to choose books out of his comfort zone that he might actually like, though it is tempting to make him read something really complicated and dense, like As I Lay Dying. for my own twisted amusement.

As he finishes each book. we’ll have a conversation about it and I’ll post the results here.

First shelf: The Road Trip Books.

There’s a couple of good options here to get him hooked. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman has the kind of mild mannered but destined for greatness hero that Dad likes, but the fantasy element might be too much for him.  I could also make him embrace Maureen Johnson on this shelf, but I might save her Jack the Ripper book for that purpose.  John Green is represented here too, and that’s pretty tempting.

Ultimately, it came down to A Wrinkle in Time or The Phantom Tollbooth, two books from middle school with some fantastical elements.  I finally decided on a A Wrinkle in Time because I think he’ll like the adventure and I want him to read something with a female protagonist.

from the publisher’s website

I’ll give him the book this weekend and report back once he finishes; my guess is that he’ll have something amusing to say, so stay tuned.