We’re always interested in what people are reading: We’re the ones on buses craning our necks to get a look at book titles and authors. Perhaps you’re the one maneuvering the book cover at the perfect covert angle to make us really work for our noseyness. Or perhaps, like us, you also notice what others are reading. No judgments; no assumptions. Just curiosity.
Here are a few titles we spotted on Metro and Sound Transit buses around Seattle earlier this week:
- Chocolate Flava: The Eroticanoir.com Anthology by Zane (Route 15 on 4/28)
- The Life and Times of Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson (Route 77 on 4/29)
- Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour by Kate Fox (Route 77 on 4/29)
- Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge (Route 7 on 4/29)
- Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking (Route 28 on 4/29)
- Museums and Galleries of Paris / Insight Guides (Route 28 on 4/29)
- The Waitress Was New by Dominique Fabre (Route 28 on 4/29)
- Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris (Route 66 on 4/29)
- Naughty Neighbor by Janet Evanovich (Route 121 on 4/29)
- Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen (Route 120 on 4/29)
- Is This a Great Game, or What? by Tim Kurkjian (Route 17 on 4/30)
- Rich Woman: A Book on Investing for Women – Because I Hate Being Told What to Do! by Kim Kiyosaki (Route 17 on 4/30)
- Whitney, My Love by Judith McNaught (Route 17 on 4/30)
- The New Downtown Library: Designing with Communities by Shannon Christine Mattern (Route 17 on 4/30)
- Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace — One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson (Route 77 on 4/30
- The Lost Sailors by Jean-Claude Izzo (Route 34 on 4/30)
- Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen (Route 5 on 5/1)
- Harvesting the Heart by Jodi Picoult (Route 5 on 5/1)
- The Stone Gods by Jeanette Winterson (Route 5 on 5/1)
- Killer Year: Stories to Die for — from the Hottest New Crime Writers, Lee Child, ed. (Route 39 on 5/1)
- Names My Sisters Call Me by Megan Crane (Route 77 on 5/1)
- The Final Forest: The Battle for the Last Great Trees of the Pacific Northwest by William Dietrich (Sound Transit #510 on 5/1)
- Delusion by Peter Abrahams (Route 303 on 5/1)
What have you seen people reading on Metro buses recently?
Five of these 23 books were on South End buses. There’s the nub of everything – the need for education, literacy, public libraries – right there.
Half the black and latino kids still drop out of high school down there, and when they do they’re far enough behind that they might have a junior high level education by then.
So where’s the list of books they’re reading in jail?
I, too, am always interested to see what people are reading on the bus! What I’m really curious about, and alas can’t see, is what people are LISTENING to. Are they listening to music or, like me, are they listening to audio books? When I ride Metro I love to listen to historical fiction which really “transports” me to a different place. Recently I enjoyed “Course of Honor” by Lindsey Davis, which is set in ancient Rome. It is narrated by Caenis, a freed slave who is mistress to the Emperor Vespasian. (Davis is also the author of a number of mysteries set in ancient Rome.)
Love the idea of tracking books anonymously on the bus! I read my books on the Amazon Kindle e-book reader, so I usually have about 50 books with me. It’s a great conversation starter: first, what the device is, and second, what I’m reading on it now.
Reading is for me the best thing about time spent on the bus. These days i mostly commute by bike, and I’ve noticed that the fewer bus trips, the bigger the pile of books at home… if I ride the 66, I even have time for Sudoku or a crossowrd puzzle, but if I ride the 41, it’s gotta be something quick like magazines.
Uh-oh. This spying on busses could get addictive. Last night on the 39 going home, I saw people reading ‘The Man in the High Castle,’ by Phillip K Dick, a tiny Bible (which may or may not have been in Spanish), some kind of test-prep or text book, a big coffee-table book about Tupac Shakur which looked really cool as it had all sorts of little notes and fold-ins you to look at, and something that looked like ’50 Things You Can Do (…to save the planet?’ …to save humanity?’ …to save yourself?’ Along those lines, anyway). Plus a couple of newspapers. In fact, one of the only people not reading was ME: I was too busy looking over other people’s shoulders!
It is definitely interesting to see what others are reading. For six years I rode the 48 bus after school from UW to the Rainier area. I was always fascinated by how people were able to read their text books on the bus. I tried this myself and it takes major concentration!
Yesterday I was on the 106 route going home and the woman sitting next to me was reading a work related document (total concentration). I tend to read light weight books on the bus. It’s already hard enough to concentrate with the bus bouncing around.
Hey, I saw that Tupac book at the library the other day. It’s called
Tupac Shakur legacy by Jamal Joseph. It is really cool!
I also find myself looking at the titles people are reading, and if it is something I have read, I might let them know I enjoyed it too. Yes, I’m one of those nosey people on the bus!
I realized as a result of this post that I had very little idea of what people tend to read on my South End bus, so I started looking on purpose and realized why that is: Some people put home-made paper jackets on their books so you can’t see the cover, a lot read in languages I don’t know, and one the other day was reading a Kindle! That was the first time I’d seen one of those in person. (Maybe it was you, anon!)
My northend bus is going peacefully zen. I’ve seen a lot of the various Eckhart Tolle titles lately. I’m always happy to have a good book on my digital player to listen to when I don’t get lucky enough to grab a seat. Keeps me peaceful, too! Though when I do get a seat, I’m most likely to be devouring the latest Entertainment Weekly. And I’m always scouring the ad banners for the bus poetry. I’m just not really enlightened enough to just stare into space during the ride as about half my fellow passengers seem to do. And don’t get me started about the cell phone users..