Some people, when they go out to eat, always try something new. Call them adventurous. Call them explorers. Other people, when they go out to eat, always order their favorites. My Uncle Harry, a mean tease whom I hated visiting when I was a kid, would have called them “stick-in-the-muds.”
Myself, I’m somewhere in between. (My late mother, whose byword was “moderation,” would have approved.) We very rarely eat out—partly for economic reasons and partly because neither of us, my S.O. or I, feels comfortable driving in the dark. If we do go out for dinner, and our destination is our fave Thai restaurant, I always order the Nam Sod appetizer and one or the other of two main courses: the Sizzling Chicken or the Pa Naeng Curry (sometimes I order pork, sometimes chicken). If we go anywhere else, though, I don’t stick to always-the-same-thing.
But what’s my point in telling you this? After all, this is a books blog, not a food blog. Simple! My point is that, while it’s fine to read a lot of books in your favorite genre, whether that’s sci-fi, how-to, romance, inspirational, humor, chick lit, or something else, you should also experiment and dip your feet in new and different waters.
Until you try a new genre, you can’t know how much you might like it. Granted, you can probably form an opinion about such genres as westerns, romances, and sci-fi without having read one, and the chances are you’ll be right. But then again, you might not. And even if you’re not a religious person, are you sure that religious-themed books have nothing to offer you? If you aren’t raising kids, you’re probably safe skipping parenting books, but even if you don’t own a pet, there are many books about animals that might well catch your interest. And even if you don’t feel a lack of motivation in your life, a motivational book could well give you an extra boost.
I could go on, but I think you get the idea by now. Just as you—hopefully—expand your dining horizons and try new foods, it’s good to expand your reading horizons and try new books, new genres.
When was the last time you read a book of poetry? And did you know that play scripts are published in book form? While reading a script doesn’t have the same impact as attending a performance, the cost of a book is a helluva lot cheaper than a pair of tickets—especially if, like me, you insist on sitting in good seats down front when you go to the theater.
Expand your horizons. I challenge you to buy or borrow a book that’s outside of your usual genres.
You may be delighted with the results.