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Hello. This is Cari. I’m a teacher with the online English school, Englishdom.com.
Today, I’m going to talk with you about books.
So, do you enjoy reading? What kind of books do you like? Do you prefer to read hardbacks
or paperbacks? Or, do you prefer the new style of e-books? Do you like to read fiction or
non-fiction? What kind of genre do you enjoy (mystery, romance, biographies)? Do you like
movies based on books? Or do you prefer to just read the books?
Who do you enjoy reading with? Do you read and share the information with others? Do
you read to your children? What do you enjoy reading? Only books? Or,
also magazines or newspapers? When do you like to read? Do you like to read
at night before you go to sleep? Do you like to read the newspaper in the morning before
you go to work? Or, maybe you like to take a book with you on vacation or during the
summer while you’re sitting out in the backyard enjoying some of the warm weather?
Where do you like to read? Um, do you only read when you’re on vacation? Do you read
at home? Do you read in a bookstore or a cafe? Do you mostly read only at work?
And, why do you read? Do you read for information or for enjoyment or both?
Some phrases or idioms that we use when we’re talking about reading or books are…the first
one is to be a bookworm. A bookworm is a person who loves to read. They’re reading constantly.
Um, this also leads to people often saying that you have your nose in a book. My mother
used to tell me, “You always have your nose in a book! Go outside and play.” I was probably
one of the only children who was reprimanded for reading too much!
Something else that we often say which is related to the idea of stories or books is
the truth is stranger than fiction. This is a saying that people use when they have an
incredible story that’s hard to believe. And, we say, “Well, you know, the truth
is stranger than fiction.” Meaning… sometimes things happen that we couldn’t invent or
make-up, they’re just too unbelievable or too crazy.
Another idiom that’s related to books is he wrote the book on that. When we’re talking
about a person (man or woman) and we say, “Well, he wrote the book on that,” we’re
implying that that person is an expert about that topic. Maybe they didn’t actually write
a book, but that’s the implication. Another idiom is you can’t judge a book
by its cover. This is probably one of the most common idioms that I’ve heard in my
lifetime. You can’t judge a book by its cover literally means you can’t look at
the cover of a book and say, “Oh. No. That’s boring. I don’t wanna read that. Oh, yeah.
This one looks interesting.” You have to find out some information about the book first.
Maybe you read the synopsis on the back. Maybe you have a book review from a newspaper or
a recommendation from a friend or a librarian. But, this also applies to people in general.
Meaning you can’t look at a person and judge how that person is (uh, their personality,
their behaviors, their characteristics). You need to get to know them a little bit first
before you make a judgment about them. So, that’s a little bit of information about
books and reading. Of course, in our discussion clubs, we’re going to talk about this even
more. So, please prepare yourself by going over our Weekly Box. You can see this video,
along with some vocabulary and conversation questions, practice exercises… And then,
you can join us in a discussion club to share your ideas and opinions and information. You
can also go to the forum on our Facebook page to share (in writing) some of your thoughts
about books and reading with other students. We look forward to hearing from you and hope
that you join us soon. Feel English and feel free. Bye for now.