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Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age
This book helps readers develop practices that will result in deep, formative, and faithful reading so they can contribute to the flourishing of their communities and cultivate their own spiritual and intellectual depth.
The authors present reading as a remedy for three prevalent cultural vices--distraction, hostility, and consumerism--that impact the possibility of formative reading. Informed by James K. A. Smith's work on "the spiritual power of habit," Deep Reading provides resources for engaging in formative and culturally subversive reading practices that teach readers how to resist vices, love virtue, and desire the good.
Rather than emphasizing the spiritual benefits of reading specific texts such as Dante's Divine Comedy or Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the authors focus on the practice of reading itself. They examine practices many teachers, students, and avid readers employ--such as reading lists, reading logs, and discussion--and demonstrate how such practices can be more effectively and intentionally harnessed to result in deep reading. The practices apply to any work that is meant to be read deeply.
The authors present reading as a remedy for three prevalent cultural vices--distraction, hostility, and consumerism--that impact the possibility of formative reading. Informed by James K. A. Smith's work on "the spiritual power of habit," Deep Reading provides resources for engaging in formative and culturally subversive reading practices that teach readers how to resist vices, love virtue, and desire the good.
Rather than emphasizing the spiritual benefits of reading specific texts such as Dante's Divine Comedy or Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the authors focus on the practice of reading itself. They examine practices many teachers, students, and avid readers employ--such as reading lists, reading logs, and discussion--and demonstrate how such practices can be more effectively and intentionally harnessed to result in deep reading. The practices apply to any work that is meant to be read deeply.
227 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 28, 2024
18 people are currently reading
257 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
June 11, 2024
I’m really tired of utilitarian defenses of the humanities—graphs and charts that show the so-called scientific reasons why we should read. Blah blah blah. We read because stories are, at the end of the day, fun.
These authors understand the value of reading and have no wish to defend the benefits by citing statistics. Instead, though this book remains academic in its approach, the heart of the book is that reading connects us to our neighbors and humbles our contemporary viewpoint and ultimately resists the mindset that we must corral every moment of our lives in order to be better workers.
The authors serve us an excellent, well-researched response to delightful books like On Reading Well by Karen Swallow Prior and The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction by Alan Jacobs (both of which are celebrations of reading I highly recommend). Their purpose goes a step beyond these earlier books in that they want to reveal how reading deeply resists three contemporary impulses towards distraction, hostility, and consumerism. I already eagerly agreed with their premises and was glad to find such robust support for their claims, most of which came from books I’d already enjoyed. They extended their claims into practical classroom activities that will help teachers and group leaders facilitate reading experiences. I really loved the practical suggestions more than anything else in this book and have littered my copy with ideas sparked by their teaching practice.
This may not be a book for everyone but it is precisely the kind of book I love. I love any celebration of the humanities that relies on the winsome enthusiasm. I love practical classroom practices (I found myself particularly wishing several times I could redo my own very secular college humanities experience and sit under Ooms’ intentional teaching!) I won’t deny that parts could be a bit dry and I found their tone towards my beloved Leland Ryken to be overly dismissive, but I truly couldn’t stop reading this book. I found chapter four to be a particularly lively and engaging chapter on a resisting the impulse to simply censor books and instead developing prudence by engaging books on their own terms.
I’m so glad I bought it so I could underline and interact with the ideas fully and I already can’t wait to implement what I’ve learned in the fall as a high school English teacher at a Christian school.
See this article by O Alan Noble, with notable overlap: https://newsletter.oalannoble.com/p/t...
These authors understand the value of reading and have no wish to defend the benefits by citing statistics. Instead, though this book remains academic in its approach, the heart of the book is that reading connects us to our neighbors and humbles our contemporary viewpoint and ultimately resists the mindset that we must corral every moment of our lives in order to be better workers.
The authors serve us an excellent, well-researched response to delightful books like On Reading Well by Karen Swallow Prior and The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction by Alan Jacobs (both of which are celebrations of reading I highly recommend). Their purpose goes a step beyond these earlier books in that they want to reveal how reading deeply resists three contemporary impulses towards distraction, hostility, and consumerism. I already eagerly agreed with their premises and was glad to find such robust support for their claims, most of which came from books I’d already enjoyed. They extended their claims into practical classroom activities that will help teachers and group leaders facilitate reading experiences. I really loved the practical suggestions more than anything else in this book and have littered my copy with ideas sparked by their teaching practice.
This may not be a book for everyone but it is precisely the kind of book I love. I love any celebration of the humanities that relies on the winsome enthusiasm. I love practical classroom practices (I found myself particularly wishing several times I could redo my own very secular college humanities experience and sit under Ooms’ intentional teaching!) I won’t deny that parts could be a bit dry and I found their tone towards my beloved Leland Ryken to be overly dismissive, but I truly couldn’t stop reading this book. I found chapter four to be a particularly lively and engaging chapter on a resisting the impulse to simply censor books and instead developing prudence by engaging books on their own terms.
I’m so glad I bought it so I could underline and interact with the ideas fully and I already can’t wait to implement what I’ve learned in the fall as a high school English teacher at a Christian school.
See this article by O Alan Noble, with notable overlap: https://newsletter.oalannoble.com/p/t...
June 19, 2024
The authors (one of whom is a friend of mine) offer a thoughtful critique of the pervasive cultural trends, from all over the ideological spectrum, that damage our ability to read deeply, and share practices tested in their own classrooms to help us overcome these trends and bring back the delight of reading. The style is academic and rather formal, but there are lots of very helpful ideas and insights here that are well worth exploring. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.
November 19, 2024
A look at the importance of reading not only from a reading list perspective but from reading habits and the impact reading habits can have on life generally speaking. Several suggestions for how to incorporate deep reading into college courses.
September 10, 2024
Since I typically read a lot, I thought it would be good to learn about how to read. I still believe that, but I picked up Griffis et al. based exclusively on the title, completely missing the fact that this is a book by Christian academics on how to teach literature to Christian university students.
Their emphasis is on developing reading practices that decrease the pernicious influence of the modern vices of social media distraction, the hostility of polarized and ideologically driven reading, and judging everything from a consumer perspective. Worthwhile goals.
Of course, they also emphasize how better reading and teaching habits can help students to develop Christian virtues. The list of Christian virtues and vices is not greatly different from that originally promulgated by early Greek philosophers. Anyone with an interest in Stoicism or similar versions of virtue philosophy may also find parts of the book useful.
The tone and content of this book are quite academic with plenty of references, some of which I may follow up on. The actual “practices” tend to be drowned in philosophic arguments about the merits of alternate reading styles, and the practices themselves tend to focus on things that may help a teacher in the classroom (e.g., encouraging students to look at the person who is speaking in a discussion group). I didn’t find many of them to be anything I haven’t already thought of or that I don’t already do.
For me this was largely a waste of time but at least the book is short, and it may well be of greater use to its intended audience, Christian literature instructors in Christian schools of higher education. However, even at that, Christian readers should beware that the writers do not to support many Evangelical Christian views.
Their emphasis is on developing reading practices that decrease the pernicious influence of the modern vices of social media distraction, the hostility of polarized and ideologically driven reading, and judging everything from a consumer perspective. Worthwhile goals.
Of course, they also emphasize how better reading and teaching habits can help students to develop Christian virtues. The list of Christian virtues and vices is not greatly different from that originally promulgated by early Greek philosophers. Anyone with an interest in Stoicism or similar versions of virtue philosophy may also find parts of the book useful.
The tone and content of this book are quite academic with plenty of references, some of which I may follow up on. The actual “practices” tend to be drowned in philosophic arguments about the merits of alternate reading styles, and the practices themselves tend to focus on things that may help a teacher in the classroom (e.g., encouraging students to look at the person who is speaking in a discussion group). I didn’t find many of them to be anything I haven’t already thought of or that I don’t already do.
For me this was largely a waste of time but at least the book is short, and it may well be of greater use to its intended audience, Christian literature instructors in Christian schools of higher education. However, even at that, Christian readers should beware that the writers do not to support many Evangelical Christian views.
January 10, 2025
Summary: Practices to grow in attentive reading that subverts distraction, hostility, and consumerism.
Many books on reading focus on what to read, offering reading lists of good or “great” books. The authors of this book take a different approach. They believe we are in a culture that undermines the deep reading of any text. Thus they focus on practices to subvert what they believe are three vices of our culture: distraction, hostility, and consumerism. Likewise, they believe these practices help cultivate virtue and good character. Unlike other approaches by Christian educators, they focus on practice rather than worldview approaches that often feed vices of hostility and consumerism that work against virtuous reading and the appreciation of a text.
For each of the three cultural advices the authors address, they consider two sets of formational practices
Subverting Distraction
First of all under this heading, they consider practices to cultivate temperance, particularly with the digital devices in our lives. The authors observe the disembodied attention digital technology engenders as opposed to embodied engagement with a text and a community of other readers. They suggest gradually extending periods of uninterrupted reading, leaving phones and other screens in another room. Positively, they encourage the use of practices like lectio divina and other slow reading practices to deeply engage texts rather than the skimming we often practice.
Second, they focus on “Attentive Reading Processes for a Digital Age.” Surprisingly, they do not rule out using a variety of media to engage a text: audio-, electronic-, and physical books. This is one of the first books on reading I’ve read to recognize neurodiverse readers and that reading processes will vary from person to person. Equity and inclusion allow for these different approaches, even allowing students to secure different (and sometimes cheaper) versions of a text rather than as syllabus-mandated version, requiring adjustments when referencing the text. One of the authors describes setting aside time in class for communal reading using reading logs and how this helped students develop attention.
Subverting Hostility
First the authors engage the practice of developing diverse reading lists, often using worldview as a launching point for polemics for and against ideologies. Rather, they encourage the development of reading lists to develop empathy and charity. They discuss listening to texts from the past with neighborly charity, not ignoring racism or patriarchy, but also seeing past them to enter deeply into the author’s perception of the world in their day. Sometimes a contemporaneous text with a contrasting view may be read alongside.
Second, rather than fearing harm from diverse worldviews, the authors address reading practices for interpreting worldviews. They encourage an approach of prudent wisdom rather than hostility or fear. This includes reading widely, reading primary texts rather than hostile summaries. It means reading with self-forgetfulness that seeks to meet a text on its terms rather than ours. It involves distinguishing cultural mores from good and evil. The authors also consider the use of trigger and content warnings.
Subverting Consumerism
Reading can often be reduced to a transactional activity where information is a commodity and even others in online communities are commodified. First of all, the authors explore reading a as a gift-giving conversation. This assumes reading in a community. It begins with forming open-ended questions of the text and one another and practicing generosity in conversations in putting away distracting media and communicating intent listening through one’s body. It assumes a collaborative rather than competitive approach to understanding a text.
Finally, the authors address learning to read for enjoyment, rather than just getting one’s money’s worth. They explore Joseph Pieper’s idea of leisure in contrast to the total work/total entertainment ethos of our culture. In teaching settings, they encourage beginning with easy or familiar texts and incorporating humor. One author uses commonplace books in which students record compelling passages or pair poetry and images.
Reflections
As may be apparent, this book is written by Christian educators, reflecting applications in a primarily Christian setting. Yet I believe the practices they commend may be adapted more widely. In particular, there is a crisis of student disinterest in reading in higher education, a place where reading deeply is crucial to student formation. The practices commended here appear to address the recovery of reading for joy at the heart of a lifelong love of reading.
The practices the authors commend seem applicable beyond the classroom. Many of us are conscious of the ways our culture has undermined our own experience of deep reading. In particular, the stress on vice, virtue, and character gets at what many of us believe, but do not always experience–that reading can be transformative.
I also appreciate the authors critique of worldview approaches to reading. I learned to read this way as a young adult. And I appreciated the discernment it offered me. Only in more recent years have I realized the implicit hostility with which I approached texts. This prevented me from fully appreciating them and understanding the world of an author or the characters.
Finally, there is so much here about reading in community and how that may be done well that has applicability to Bible studies and book groups. In our individualistic society, we tend to view reading as a solitary activity. I love the idea of conversations around texts as a form of gift-giving. Reading, or even talking about books with others, is almost invariably mutually enriching.
I so appreciate the approach of these authors. Rather than rail against disinterested or distracted readers, they invite us into the joy of deep reading by showing us how. Rather than complain about consumeristic approaches, they commend a better way. Instead of protesting polemics, they position us to listen and engage with charity. and in so doing, they help us become not only better readers, but perhaps, better people.
_____________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
Many books on reading focus on what to read, offering reading lists of good or “great” books. The authors of this book take a different approach. They believe we are in a culture that undermines the deep reading of any text. Thus they focus on practices to subvert what they believe are three vices of our culture: distraction, hostility, and consumerism. Likewise, they believe these practices help cultivate virtue and good character. Unlike other approaches by Christian educators, they focus on practice rather than worldview approaches that often feed vices of hostility and consumerism that work against virtuous reading and the appreciation of a text.
For each of the three cultural advices the authors address, they consider two sets of formational practices
Subverting Distraction
First of all under this heading, they consider practices to cultivate temperance, particularly with the digital devices in our lives. The authors observe the disembodied attention digital technology engenders as opposed to embodied engagement with a text and a community of other readers. They suggest gradually extending periods of uninterrupted reading, leaving phones and other screens in another room. Positively, they encourage the use of practices like lectio divina and other slow reading practices to deeply engage texts rather than the skimming we often practice.
Second, they focus on “Attentive Reading Processes for a Digital Age.” Surprisingly, they do not rule out using a variety of media to engage a text: audio-, electronic-, and physical books. This is one of the first books on reading I’ve read to recognize neurodiverse readers and that reading processes will vary from person to person. Equity and inclusion allow for these different approaches, even allowing students to secure different (and sometimes cheaper) versions of a text rather than as syllabus-mandated version, requiring adjustments when referencing the text. One of the authors describes setting aside time in class for communal reading using reading logs and how this helped students develop attention.
Subverting Hostility
First the authors engage the practice of developing diverse reading lists, often using worldview as a launching point for polemics for and against ideologies. Rather, they encourage the development of reading lists to develop empathy and charity. They discuss listening to texts from the past with neighborly charity, not ignoring racism or patriarchy, but also seeing past them to enter deeply into the author’s perception of the world in their day. Sometimes a contemporaneous text with a contrasting view may be read alongside.
Second, rather than fearing harm from diverse worldviews, the authors address reading practices for interpreting worldviews. They encourage an approach of prudent wisdom rather than hostility or fear. This includes reading widely, reading primary texts rather than hostile summaries. It means reading with self-forgetfulness that seeks to meet a text on its terms rather than ours. It involves distinguishing cultural mores from good and evil. The authors also consider the use of trigger and content warnings.
Subverting Consumerism
Reading can often be reduced to a transactional activity where information is a commodity and even others in online communities are commodified. First of all, the authors explore reading a as a gift-giving conversation. This assumes reading in a community. It begins with forming open-ended questions of the text and one another and practicing generosity in conversations in putting away distracting media and communicating intent listening through one’s body. It assumes a collaborative rather than competitive approach to understanding a text.
Finally, the authors address learning to read for enjoyment, rather than just getting one’s money’s worth. They explore Joseph Pieper’s idea of leisure in contrast to the total work/total entertainment ethos of our culture. In teaching settings, they encourage beginning with easy or familiar texts and incorporating humor. One author uses commonplace books in which students record compelling passages or pair poetry and images.
Reflections
As may be apparent, this book is written by Christian educators, reflecting applications in a primarily Christian setting. Yet I believe the practices they commend may be adapted more widely. In particular, there is a crisis of student disinterest in reading in higher education, a place where reading deeply is crucial to student formation. The practices commended here appear to address the recovery of reading for joy at the heart of a lifelong love of reading.
The practices the authors commend seem applicable beyond the classroom. Many of us are conscious of the ways our culture has undermined our own experience of deep reading. In particular, the stress on vice, virtue, and character gets at what many of us believe, but do not always experience–that reading can be transformative.
I also appreciate the authors critique of worldview approaches to reading. I learned to read this way as a young adult. And I appreciated the discernment it offered me. Only in more recent years have I realized the implicit hostility with which I approached texts. This prevented me from fully appreciating them and understanding the world of an author or the characters.
Finally, there is so much here about reading in community and how that may be done well that has applicability to Bible studies and book groups. In our individualistic society, we tend to view reading as a solitary activity. I love the idea of conversations around texts as a form of gift-giving. Reading, or even talking about books with others, is almost invariably mutually enriching.
I so appreciate the approach of these authors. Rather than rail against disinterested or distracted readers, they invite us into the joy of deep reading by showing us how. Rather than complain about consumeristic approaches, they commend a better way. Instead of protesting polemics, they position us to listen and engage with charity. and in so doing, they help us become not only better readers, but perhaps, better people.
_____________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.
December 21, 2025
I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
The positive: Griffis, Ooms, and Roberts invite readers to abandon the muddy waters of consumeristic, hostile, and distracted reading and drink deeply of the rich delights of good books. Their description of the distracting devices, frenzied busyness, duty-driven mindset, and consumeristic impulses that can damage our souls and communities are helpful and convicting reminders. Their advice and practical tips for adopting an attitude of respectful neighborliness towards any book instead of suspicion or hostility are encouraging and thought-provoking. For example, they suggest working with students to examine the materiality of an older text, how it was physically brought to life. I found this part especially helpful in a culture accustomed to an endless supply of paperbacks, hard cover copies, and ebooks. The sections on approaching trigger or content warnings and the joy of rereading are particularly insightful for teachers and students. The footnotes are also a great resource for anyone researching the practice of reading or teaching literature.
The negative: While the book is full of great aspirations for engaging with texts in community, Griffis, Ooms, and Roberts’s criticism of certain schools of thought and modes of reading felt strangely hostile - condemning rather than charitable (while they are urging their readers to be charitable). They are hard on the Protestant work ethic, the Puritans (whom they address as one homogenous group), white evangelicals, John Piper, Leland Ryken, and the Worldview approach to literature. Chapter 3, on book lists and the literary canon, was exhausting to read, far more political and polemic than I was prepared for.
The book’s greatest gap is the absence of thoughtful engagement with Scripture as the plumb line for wisdom, charity, and humility. For example, the authors bring up the danger of casually citing and weaponizing Bible verses out of context but don’t discuss or model what a reverent, discerning application of Biblical theology looks like. Especially in the chapters on creating book lists and interpreting worldviews, they suggest a variety of creative methods to encourage inclusivity, prudence, “promiscuous” reading, and self-forgetfulness, but make only passing references to Scripture. They do not discuss how a reader can meditate on Scripture as the one text with the authority to address every complex layer of right and wrong, vice and virtue, beauty and ugliness in all times and contexts.
The positive: Griffis, Ooms, and Roberts invite readers to abandon the muddy waters of consumeristic, hostile, and distracted reading and drink deeply of the rich delights of good books. Their description of the distracting devices, frenzied busyness, duty-driven mindset, and consumeristic impulses that can damage our souls and communities are helpful and convicting reminders. Their advice and practical tips for adopting an attitude of respectful neighborliness towards any book instead of suspicion or hostility are encouraging and thought-provoking. For example, they suggest working with students to examine the materiality of an older text, how it was physically brought to life. I found this part especially helpful in a culture accustomed to an endless supply of paperbacks, hard cover copies, and ebooks. The sections on approaching trigger or content warnings and the joy of rereading are particularly insightful for teachers and students. The footnotes are also a great resource for anyone researching the practice of reading or teaching literature.
The negative: While the book is full of great aspirations for engaging with texts in community, Griffis, Ooms, and Roberts’s criticism of certain schools of thought and modes of reading felt strangely hostile - condemning rather than charitable (while they are urging their readers to be charitable). They are hard on the Protestant work ethic, the Puritans (whom they address as one homogenous group), white evangelicals, John Piper, Leland Ryken, and the Worldview approach to literature. Chapter 3, on book lists and the literary canon, was exhausting to read, far more political and polemic than I was prepared for.
The book’s greatest gap is the absence of thoughtful engagement with Scripture as the plumb line for wisdom, charity, and humility. For example, the authors bring up the danger of casually citing and weaponizing Bible verses out of context but don’t discuss or model what a reverent, discerning application of Biblical theology looks like. Especially in the chapters on creating book lists and interpreting worldviews, they suggest a variety of creative methods to encourage inclusivity, prudence, “promiscuous” reading, and self-forgetfulness, but make only passing references to Scripture. They do not discuss how a reader can meditate on Scripture as the one text with the authority to address every complex layer of right and wrong, vice and virtue, beauty and ugliness in all times and contexts.
August 29, 2024
First of all, I was unaware that this book was geared more towards helping others read deeply. With tips for classrooms and ways to accommodate students, this is definitely a teachers book that seems to be marketed to a larger audience. Maybe I should have been more selective in my book choices, but I definitely felt bamboozled.
But hey, I'm a dad, I can use all the help I can in teaching people how to read well. And honestly, there is a lot of good in the book. I like the emphasis on reading for pleasure and not as a consumer, the thinking of authors as people and treating them charitably, and even the insight that often progressives and conservatives often both don't like certain books because of a search for ideological purity.
But guys, can we just talk about how bad the writing is. It's already hard to pull off a multiple-author book. But it doesn't even seem like these guys are trying. I really resonate with the reviewer who says that this book reads like an academic thesis and who tallied up that there were 551 citations in the only 200 something pages of text. Maybe the authors are great people, but this book was hard to get through.
Also, one thing that this book really impressed on me was how exhausting it is to be a progressive. It's clear that the authors run a little left of me, which is fine, a lot of people do, but this book is seriously like the scene from "the good place" where Eleanor finds out that nobody can be a good person because things have become so complex. The authors talk about how good it is to have someone from another background speak about a text. But make sure that you don't make them a token, just because of their background.
As a final note, the treatment of "white supremacy" was just really bad. White supremacy is responsible for consumeristic cultures and efficiency which keeps us from reading leisurely? As if leisure reading is something that my parents did in the Indian school systems. Consumeristic cultures are rooted in white supremacy? Have you seen an Indian street vendor? When did it become okay to tag vices that beset us all on a skin color? A reductionist vision of what is wrong with the world is always going to produce reductionistic solutions.
But hey, I'm a dad, I can use all the help I can in teaching people how to read well. And honestly, there is a lot of good in the book. I like the emphasis on reading for pleasure and not as a consumer, the thinking of authors as people and treating them charitably, and even the insight that often progressives and conservatives often both don't like certain books because of a search for ideological purity.
But guys, can we just talk about how bad the writing is. It's already hard to pull off a multiple-author book. But it doesn't even seem like these guys are trying. I really resonate with the reviewer who says that this book reads like an academic thesis and who tallied up that there were 551 citations in the only 200 something pages of text. Maybe the authors are great people, but this book was hard to get through.
Also, one thing that this book really impressed on me was how exhausting it is to be a progressive. It's clear that the authors run a little left of me, which is fine, a lot of people do, but this book is seriously like the scene from "the good place" where Eleanor finds out that nobody can be a good person because things have become so complex. The authors talk about how good it is to have someone from another background speak about a text. But make sure that you don't make them a token, just because of their background.
As a final note, the treatment of "white supremacy" was just really bad. White supremacy is responsible for consumeristic cultures and efficiency which keeps us from reading leisurely? As if leisure reading is something that my parents did in the Indian school systems. Consumeristic cultures are rooted in white supremacy? Have you seen an Indian street vendor? When did it become okay to tag vices that beset us all on a skin color? A reductionist vision of what is wrong with the world is always going to produce reductionistic solutions.
September 27, 2024
The main thesis of this book is one that I admire: reading (and learning in general) should not always aim at practicality and usefulness. Reading deeply can navigate the channel between the Charybdis of consumerism and the Scylla of distraction. They give many practices that one can enact as an educator, book club leader, or even just a reader. It seems that the target audience for this book is primarily those who are educators in the humanities (especially English departments).
For this reason, I am being generous with the rating. The authors get midway into controversial territory to claim that deep reading can provide a solution to the problems of society. Some of these controversial areas include censorship, systemic racism, and hustle culture. The one they deal with the most thoroughly is hustle culture as the refrain throughout the book is that we should not live materialistically where the bottom line is all that matters. Even then, the authors
Much more problematic are how they present censorship and systemic racism. The authors are right in showing the detrimental affects of contemporary American Christian's attempting to censor certain books and always being concerned with worldview criticism. Censorship has been debated at least since the fourth century BCE in Plato's Republic when he bans homer from his hypothetical polis for his immoral and impious content. The authors never address if or when censorship is ever appropriate and they seem to oversimplify the issue greatly. Nevertheless, I am sympathetic to their fight against Christian virtue signaling that judges people over the books they read. Different things tempt different people; while I have enjoyed Harry Potter and found great moral benefit in it, others are seduced by it into witchcraft.
Likewise, their discussion of the issues of systemic racism within the education system and broader society is weak. It is only convincing to those who are already aware of such issues. The practices that they give to help include minority voices is good, but they do not have to put it within such a controversial framework. This only creates interference with the target audience (broadly evangelical Christians, whom they criticize throughout the work).
For this reason, I am being generous with the rating. The authors get midway into controversial territory to claim that deep reading can provide a solution to the problems of society. Some of these controversial areas include censorship, systemic racism, and hustle culture. The one they deal with the most thoroughly is hustle culture as the refrain throughout the book is that we should not live materialistically where the bottom line is all that matters. Even then, the authors
Much more problematic are how they present censorship and systemic racism. The authors are right in showing the detrimental affects of contemporary American Christian's attempting to censor certain books and always being concerned with worldview criticism. Censorship has been debated at least since the fourth century BCE in Plato's Republic when he bans homer from his hypothetical polis for his immoral and impious content. The authors never address if or when censorship is ever appropriate and they seem to oversimplify the issue greatly. Nevertheless, I am sympathetic to their fight against Christian virtue signaling that judges people over the books they read. Different things tempt different people; while I have enjoyed Harry Potter and found great moral benefit in it, others are seduced by it into witchcraft.
Likewise, their discussion of the issues of systemic racism within the education system and broader society is weak. It is only convincing to those who are already aware of such issues. The practices that they give to help include minority voices is good, but they do not have to put it within such a controversial framework. This only creates interference with the target audience (broadly evangelical Christians, whom they criticize throughout the work).
September 13, 2024
This book wasn’t helpful to me. First and probably foremost, I’m not the audience this book is aiming for. While the intent could be that any serious reader should glean insights for themselves, I felt this book read strongly as a book for university professors by professors. There were many references to developing the reading list and examples of teaching. Perhaps going along with that, the language is pretentious. (just one example from a random page that I picked, “Incorporating leisure practices into reading spaces in which texts are enjoyed and admired in a communal setting will go a long way toward attenuating transactional approaches toward reading.”) So I’ve concluded that I’m not the audience and it’s not written in a way that appeals to my personal taste (which the authors discuss and acknowledge is different for different people). Additionally, I felt the authors were often critical of or disparaging toward Christianity which was confusing considering the publisher is Baker. In particular they used the combined phrase Evangelical Christianity with a negative connotation – phrases like “those submerged in evangelical Christianity, are unnecessarily offended and threatened by world views that contrast with their own.” One of the authors states that “the evangelical romance novel—that had a negative, corruptive influence over my youth”. There is much discussion relating reading practices to combatting social problems like white supremacy and racial justice but I felt like these connections were sometimes stretched or overblown in order to make the content fit a particular political agenda or popular view.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher, Baker Academic & Brazos Press, for making this book available to me to review. This book came out in May 2024.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher, Baker Academic & Brazos Press, for making this book available to me to review. This book came out in May 2024.
July 31, 2024
The team of authors behind Deep Reading lament the culture-wide loss of focused attention, and they push back with powerful practices to equip educators, students, and all readers for meaningful and formative reading experiences. They have managed to do this without pages and pages of recommended books, asserting instead that “deep reading practices… matter as much as what [we] read.”
While our cultural context promotes distraction, hostility, and a consumeristic approach to everything, deep reading promotes the virtue development that comes with a flourishing reading life. We read for leisure. We read because we are human, and there is delight to be found between the covers of a book.
I especially appreciated the authors’ invitation to “listen with charity to texts from the past,” a sure defense against chronological snobbery. However, while I acknowledge the possibility that paying attention to worldview in our reading could lead to hostility in some readers, I would argue that it has the benefit of heightening discernment and encouraging the reader to identify the author’s presuppositions.
Deep Reading was written by educators, and is, therefore, full of helpful information for promoting deep reading in the classroom. However, Christian readers of all professions will find a trustworthy guide for analyzing and interrogating their own reading practices and addressing any slippage or concessions to the culture they find there.
While our cultural context promotes distraction, hostility, and a consumeristic approach to everything, deep reading promotes the virtue development that comes with a flourishing reading life. We read for leisure. We read because we are human, and there is delight to be found between the covers of a book.
I especially appreciated the authors’ invitation to “listen with charity to texts from the past,” a sure defense against chronological snobbery. However, while I acknowledge the possibility that paying attention to worldview in our reading could lead to hostility in some readers, I would argue that it has the benefit of heightening discernment and encouraging the reader to identify the author’s presuppositions.
Deep Reading was written by educators, and is, therefore, full of helpful information for promoting deep reading in the classroom. However, Christian readers of all professions will find a trustworthy guide for analyzing and interrogating their own reading practices and addressing any slippage or concessions to the culture they find there.
April 30, 2024
This book reads like a supercilious academic thesis. Dry. As. Bones. I'm very interested in what the synopsis promises, but is hard to find any actual content through the sea of wordiness and well documented references to others' works. The summary of suggested practices at the end of each chapter is literally the only thing worth reading. There is no "voice" here; it's just some English teachers (who I'm sure are lovely people) talking about English comprehension in formal tones. Every time I thought I found an original thought, that thought ended with a citation. The Netgalley e-book totals 240 pages. A full 34 pages are footnotes- bibliography and index. In the 203.5 pages that are not footnotes, there are 551 citations. Only a handful of these point to the authors' explanations (which should be found within the text itself, so that's weird). The rest point to outside sources. I suppose this gets the authors' names on a book which gives them a much respected "co-author of..." credential. Unfortunately, for me, this book could have been condensed to a single blog post instead. I was sorely disappointed.
#DeepReading #NetGalley
#DeepReading #NetGalley
August 17, 2024
The three authors of this book are English PhDs who are extremely familiar with teaching English in the classroom. In this book, they share reading practices to fight against the vices of distraction, hostility, and consumerism.
This book aligns very closely with my reading philosophy, so it was an absolute delight to read. They strongly emphasize the value of reading deeply, rereading, and establishing practices to help read more. But they also champion reading for enjoyment too. They spend time combating the worldview mentality that can be present in Christian circles where only one worldview is considered 'correct' and how that affects our choices of what to read if something is not aligned with that worldview. They emphasize reading widely to help form your worldview which is extremely important to me.
The book was slightly more oriented towards those teaching English at a college level, but I still got so much out of it. It did feel a little heavy handed with discussions of race and white supremacy, but I did appreciate the topic being brought up.
This book aligns very closely with my reading philosophy, so it was an absolute delight to read. They strongly emphasize the value of reading deeply, rereading, and establishing practices to help read more. But they also champion reading for enjoyment too. They spend time combating the worldview mentality that can be present in Christian circles where only one worldview is considered 'correct' and how that affects our choices of what to read if something is not aligned with that worldview. They emphasize reading widely to help form your worldview which is extremely important to me.
The book was slightly more oriented towards those teaching English at a college level, but I still got so much out of it. It did feel a little heavy handed with discussions of race and white supremacy, but I did appreciate the topic being brought up.
July 2, 2024
I liked a lot about this book, especially the threefold framing device of: distraction, hostility and consumerism. That's one of the most helpful, simple diagnoses of the prevailing problems of our cultural moment, and I really loved it as a lens through which to examine the practice of reading.
The book skews towards teachers, or those who run classrooms and write syllabi, but I still found much of the context challenging and encouraging. Discussions of "how to go beyond a diverse reading list," for example, feel like they are more for teachers, but I still resonated with the principles at work. In general, I really enjoyed the thoughtful and deeply nuanced discussions, all the while threading references to specific helpful books and articles throughout. I definitely don't think this is for everyone, but if you are a manic (at times, frantic!) reader like me, there is a lot here to chew on.
The book skews towards teachers, or those who run classrooms and write syllabi, but I still found much of the context challenging and encouraging. Discussions of "how to go beyond a diverse reading list," for example, feel like they are more for teachers, but I still resonated with the principles at work. In general, I really enjoyed the thoughtful and deeply nuanced discussions, all the while threading references to specific helpful books and articles throughout. I definitely don't think this is for everyone, but if you are a manic (at times, frantic!) reader like me, there is a lot here to chew on.
March 12, 2025
Not a book... just an essay with fluff... towards the end when they get towards the actual advice it gets better, but not much. A third of the way into the book they were still telling me what they were going to do in this book. Just do it!
Stop telling us who "I" is... no one is too concerned about that... also quote less often... They could do with dropping about 90% of their quotations. These teachers have been teaching kids how to write research papers with citations for so long that's all they can write.
Pretty much whatever you think about the word "subvert" will tell you what you think about this book.
Stop telling us who "I" is... no one is too concerned about that... also quote less often... They could do with dropping about 90% of their quotations. These teachers have been teaching kids how to write research papers with citations for so long that's all they can write.
Pretty much whatever you think about the word "subvert" will tell you what you think about this book.
July 20, 2025
Admittedly, I didn’t know what I was getting into when I picked up this book. Once I realized it was a book about reading, I considered returning it (despite the auspicious opportunity to say “Reid’s reading about reading”).
I’m thankful I kept reading. These authors changed the way I view and approach reading, which in many ways changes how I view and approach life.
Their critique of a worldview paradigm—the ways it leads us to approach texts (and people) as consumers and how it provokes antagonism towards anything that doesn’t fit—is something that I’ll carry forward and continue to explore.
I’m thankful I kept reading. These authors changed the way I view and approach reading, which in many ways changes how I view and approach life.
Their critique of a worldview paradigm—the ways it leads us to approach texts (and people) as consumers and how it provokes antagonism towards anything that doesn’t fit—is something that I’ll carry forward and continue to explore.
January 31, 2025
While the writing style is a little bit dense, the authors make great points and had answers to several questions I have as a reader. I found chapters 3, 4, and 6 particularly helpful in learning to navigate reading in light of today's current age. Throughout this book, they also recommend a lot of good books for further reading.
September 14, 2024
Thoughtful and helpful.
June 15, 2024
This is one of the most irritating books I have ever suffered through. I bought it on impulse when Amazon suggested I might like it. The three authors have some good insights about teaching literature in the Christian college classroom, but they also seem like they are desperate to take the “right position” and make many comments about how to avoid white supremacy and consumerism and other buzzwords in ways which fit poorly into their own arguments. For example, I marked this line as one of many examples of such insufferable trendiness. “Reading aloud and using audiobooks are practices that can disassociate reading from oppressive Western modes of textual encounter.” Then they return to describing their very western canons. Eye roll. The authors seem eager to impress the right sort of people, and yet they do not seem to actually believe any of these critical race theory tropes.
They also quote other authors at a rate of about two or three a page, in each case not actually engaging those authors’ ideas but finding one line to add to their collection of citations.
They also quote other authors at a rate of about two or three a page, in each case not actually engaging those authors’ ideas but finding one line to add to their collection of citations.
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