Daily Gazette, Sterling, Ill., Jeff Rogers column

April 23--I love books. However, I rarely read actual books these days. It's not because I'm too busy to read. It's because I have a Nook, and almost everything I read now is in electronic form.

For those of you diehards who think you never could give up the thrill of having an actual book in your hands to read, give it up. Being able to read and access books on an electronic device is wonderful.

That said, it still warms my heart to see efforts like the one by Washington Elementary School teacher Jenny Brown that was written about in Tuesday's newspaper. Today, the first-grade teacher is giving away 20 copies of a novel, "Miss Darcy Falls in Love" by Sharon Lathan, outside the school after classes dismiss for the day. Brown is doing so as part of World Book Night, which is tonight.

Now, "Miss Darcy Falls in Love" is not a book that would interest me. But I have read a number of good books in the past couple of years that I'd like to recommend today. Happy World Book Night!

Fiction

--"The Circle," by Dave Eggers

--"Gone Girl" and "Sharp Objects" by Gillian Flynn

--"The Light Between Oceans" by M.L. Steadman

--"Cutting for Stone," by Abraham Verghese

--"2030: The Real Story of What Happens to America," by Albert Brooks

--"11/22/63: A Novel," by Stephen King

--"The Art of Fielding," by Chad Harbach

--"The Visible Man," by Chuck Klosterman

--"The Descent of Man," by Kevin Desinger

--"Miss Peregrine'sHome for Peculiar Children," by Ransom Riggs

--"Eleanor & Park," by Rainbow Rowell

Nonfiction

--"Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief," by Lawrence Wright

--"Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans," by Wendell Potter

--"War," by Sebastian Junger

--"The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks," by Rebecca Skloot

--"Steve Jobs," by Walter Isaacson

--"The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap," by Matt Taibbi

--"Double Down: Game Change 2012," by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann

Some All-time Favorites

--"Life of Pi," by Yann Martel

--"Zeitoun," by Dave Eggers

--"What is the What," by Dave Eggers

--"The Time Traveler's Wife," by Audrey Niffenegger

--"Friday Night Lights: A Town, A Team, And a Dream," by H.G. Bissinger

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