“Every reader finds himself. The writer’s work is merely a kind of optical instrument that makes it possible for the reader to discern what, without this book, he would perhaps never have seen in himself.” – Marcel Proust
As a young woman, reading opened doors for me; doors I had never known were closed. Books showed me ideas, knowledge, and points of view I had never considered. Reading made me grow through stories that made me weep and characters I couldn’t get off my mind… even decades after I had closed the book. Reading lit a fire in me and sent me on a quest for knowledge and beauty. It made me long to understand science, art, and politics like never before.
A good book, a book worth remembering, mulling over, and pondering for years is not as rare as one would think. Together, my family and I found many of these books. Over the decades, my husband and I amassed our own private library of thousands of books. Nonetheless, we were also extremely heavy public library users. We patronized our local library doors and checked out astonishing amounts of books each year. In these libraries, we found books to read ourselves, to read aloud to each other, to read to our children, to look at pictures in, or to flip through for inspiration. Additionally, my hometown had a small library that was a part of a church ministry. It blessed our entire community greatly in that it loaned the kind of books we could not find at our municipal libraries. For years, we checked out books and curriculum from this quaint little library, run solely by volunteers and all on donation.
It is in the spirit of all these libraries: our home library, our municipal libraries, and our homeschool library that we have begun a small library collection to share. This library is different in that it aims specifically to encourage and inspire our friends who are taking on the daunting task of home education. These books have been donated, not just by us, but by others who recognize the value of sharing a good book. Our loved ones, businesses, and authors have all contributed to this collection. We hope these pages inspire and lead you as you walk your own reading journey!
