I'm struggling with this book. I'm almost finished but I'm still at a loss. I'm not sure what links the stories together. I'm not excited by very many of the characters. Some of the stories seem unfinished. Maybe at the end there will be some illumination. There wasn't any illumination at the end. I got through it.....but that's all I can say about it. I went online to see what other folks said in their reviews. I was surprised to see that many folks enjoyed the stories. I felt they were repetitive in theme in that the women's lives were most often defined by their relationships or lack thereof with men and their ability to procreate. I also agree with many folks who deplored the lack of proper dialog punctuation. ( )

Some stories were better than others, but overall it was pretentious and dull. ( )

I don't think Katie ward writes well. She doesn't have clear enough goals. I found most of these stories so boring, with unclear endings.. The stories didn't move. They jumped. Also like other readers, I misses the " marks. ( )

Rather to my surprise I quite enjoyed this book. It's a book about art and female experience rather than about reading - reading is the slight thread that binds them all. Liked the first story the best and the modern day story the least. Guess the author is getting at the idea of art and reading as a powerful force in humans which despite e-everything still requires physical objects for that connection - I think?? Might be wrong. ( )

After 234 pages I decided not to finish this book. I was so intrigued by the premise - about images of girls/women reading over centuries. This book delivered intense back stories for these works of art and the females depicted, but in most cases, the reading was tangential to the image. Being an avid reader since childhood (and therefore couldn't resist the title), I really wanted a story that centered on the pursuit of reading.

Even though I chose to move to another book, I want to say that Ward is a great writer.mi hope to find other novels by her - her level of detail is quite rich and is well-suited to a single story whereas this felt book read like very faintly linked short stories. ( )