

“You don’t discourage children from reading because you feel they are reading the wrong thing. Fiction you do not like is the gateway drug to other books you may prefer them to read. And not everyone has the same taste as you.”
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction

“Always worth it to have tried, even if you fail, even if you fall like a meteor forever. Better to have flamed in the darkness, to have inspired others, to have lived, than to have sat in the darkness, cursing the people who borrowed, but did not return, your candle.”
― Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances
― Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances

“We have an obligation to read aloud to our children. To read them things they enjoy. To read to them stories we are already tired of. To do the voices, to make it interesting, and not to stop reading to them just because they learn to read to themselves. We have an obligation to use reading-aloud time as bonding time, as time when no phones are being checked, when the distractions of the world are put aside. We have an obligation to use the language. To push ourselves: to find out what words mean and how to deploy them, to communicate clearly, to say what we mean. We must not attempt to freeze language, or to pretend it is a dead thing that must be revered, but we should use it as a living thing, that flows, that borrows words, that allows meanings and pronunciations to change with time.”
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction

“People who read are hiders. They hide who they are. People who hide don’t always like who they are.”
― Call Me by Your Name
― Call Me by Your Name

“Another piece of advice: I've learned over the years that everything is more or less the same amount of work. So you may as well set your sights high and try and do something really cool. There are other people around who can do the mediocre meat and potatoes work that anybody can do. So let them do that. You make the art that only you can make. You tell the stories only you can tell.”
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction
― The View from the Cheap Seats: Selected Nonfiction
Phan’s 2024 Year in Books
Take a look at Phan’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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