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13 Tips for Turning a Non-Reader Into a Reader
Have you ever known the profound frustration of getting a non-reader to read a book? Have you pressed a novel into someone’s hands and wheedled, cajoled, practically begged them to try it? Have you eagerly asked a friend again and again if they’ve read a book yet, only to be crestfallen when they say, “No?”
If so, this post is for you. I hate to break it to you, but you’re doing it wrong. You gotta step it up! To change your bibliophobe friend into a bibliophile, you don’t need superhuman powers of persuasion. You need tough love, power plays, and manipulative maneuvers. You need a group of like-minded friends with a ruthless commitment to the end goal. And you need really sneaky thinking.
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Sure, it’s going to be difficult. You’ll read these tips and think, “These are terrible things to do!” But remember this—you’re giving your friend the gift of reading, and that’s the greatest thing you can do.
So if you’re ready to truly transform a non-reader into a bookworm, here we go:
1. Plan a vacation with your friend. Neglect to tell them that there’s no wifi, no reception, no T.V., no electricity, and it’s going to rain the whole time. Bring lots of books.
2. Sneak books into your friend’s bag when they’re not looking. Maybe the urge to read will seep into them as a result of their unsuspecting proximity to books.
3. Replace all the food in their fridge with books.
4. Get all your bookworm friends to talk about the same book together. Keep talking about it until your non-reader friend becomes overwhelmed with FOMO and finally reads the book.
5. Change the setting on their phone so that every single text they send autocorrects to, “Shhh, I’m reading!”
6. Appeal to their competitive side. See who can stay off-line longer than the other. Either their willpower will crumble before yours, or they’ll take a page out of your book (pun intended) and curl up with a novel to pass the time.
7. Write a book yourself. Tell your non-reader friend that they’re in it. Watch them read as fast as they can to figure out what you said.
8. Constantly remind your non-reader friend that studies show that people who read are better, smarter, faster, stronger, taller, live longer, happier, more charismatic, have better immune systems, lower cholesterol, more aligned chakras—they just have a glow about them.
9. Randomly quote books in response to anything that they text you. Get all your reader friends to do it too. Drive your non-reader friend nuts with obscure literary references.
10. Every chance you get, ask them, “What are you reading?” Then just stare at them pointedly and sigh sadly.
11. Make them go with you to the dentist, to the DMV, to your niece’s cat’s veterinarian’s office—basically anywhere with a waiting room where they will be bored to tears. After an hour, give them a book and watch their eyes light up with joy.
12. Tell your non-reader friend that you’re all going shopping. Grab a bunch of your reader friends and drag your non-reader friend to a bookstore. Spend all day in the bookstore. Refuse to leave until you’ve found a literary genre that your non-reader friend likes.
13. It might sound cold, but you have to ignore your friend sometimes. Instead of entertaining your friend whenever you’re together, let the conversation drop and let them see you reading sometimes. When the train is delayed and you’re happily reading a book to pass the time, they’ll wish they had one too. When you’re at the beach with a page-turner and they’re staring aimlessly at the sky, they’ll wish they had a novel too. When your friend sees that you’re perfectly content and never bored, they just might want to give reading a shot.
What crazy stories do you have about convincing an avowed non-reader to read?