If you could choose a book to read to a lover, what book would you choose?

Question

It could be your nearest and dearest, or your newest love in the first flush of the beginning of days, and you decide to do something different and sweet, and read a book to them in quiet intimacy.

What book would you choose?

(My picks have included
Jeanette Winterson - Written on the Body,
Doris Lessing - Briefing for a Descent into Hell
Milan Kundera's Laughable Loves)

Answer 1

The Japanese Pillow Book is a wonderful answer. But I kind of picture being with a lover in my library on the oriental rug in front of a roaring fire reading Dr. Zhivago or maybe Breakfast at Tiffany's.
----
They're, Their, There - Three Different Words.

Careful or you may wind up in my next novel.

Pax - C.

Answer 2

Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson Bluebeard's Egg by Margaret Atwood Searching for Caleb by Anne Tyler The Razor's Edge by Somerset Maugham Little, Big by John Crowley In no particular order.

Answer 3

Depending on our tastes, there are three that I would choose from:

1. Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass
2. The ecstatic love poetry of Tagore, Rumi, or Hafiz--e.g. The Subject Tonight is Love: 60 Wild and Sweet Poems of Hafiz

The Day Sky

Let us be like
Two falling stars in the day sky

Let no one know of our sublime beauty
As we hold hands with God
And burn

Into a sacred existence that defies--
That surpasses

Every description of ecstasy
And love.

--Hafiz


3. Selections from my own upcoming chapbook I Want to See Your Eyes in These Times, inc. "Love's Sweet Caress or Love During Wartime," "Bittersweet Mystery of a Perfect Stranger"

Answer 4

If you're comfortable with religious content, and you don't mind it having sexual content, you can read passages from Song of Solomon in the Bible. I'm not very religious but there's pretty sensual stuff in there. The similes and metaphors are terrific.

Another good book is Persian Letters (Montesquieu). It takes place in Persia, and it is a series of letters between a man with a harem, the women in his harem, and the eunuchs who guard the women. Talks about most fields of intellectual and human interest. Cultural beliefs, customs, sexual freedom, restraint, religion, and justice.

Siddhartha (Hesse) is a fairly short read if you want to hear about relationships with respect to Buddhism.

If you're looking for romance classics, and you're reading to a lady...can't go wrong with the Bronte sisters. Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights are excellent when read aloud.

Looking for fun? Grab a copy of "Everything you ever wanted to know about sex but were afraid to ask" by David Ruben, MD. It was published in 1970 and it's in question and answer format. It's interesting to look at how attitudes toward sex have changed and stayed the same in the last few decades. The format also lets you and your partner take turns reading to each other. The book was the inspiration for the Woody Allen movie of the same name. Very frank discussion of everything related to sex.

Not sure exactly what you're looking for, but these are worth checking out.
Good luck!

Answer 5

oh this I have done, and I read the book called Heaven on Earth, I don't remember the first name of the lady who wrote it but her last name was Day. It is an awesome story about a lady who decides to take a vacation and go see her sister in New Mexico, and she gets a flat tire during a lightening storm, and she starts to get out to try and see if she can flag down some help when lightening strikes, then she notices headlights, when before there were none down that long stretch of highway. A handsome young gentlemen walks up to her and tries to help her and he leads her off the highway and they start to walk to the nearest town, he is a very handsome spanish gentlemen with the accent as well, and he tries to tell her that she just went backin time 100 years, but she won't beleive him, and the story gets better and better, it is a very highly recommended book to read to ones lover. very romantic and enchanting and funny too. Check it out. I think you will agree with me on this one.

Answer 6

I would choose:

1. Winnie the Pooh (I did a book report on it in high school)
2. Johnathan Livingston Seagull
3. Heaven Knows, by Joesph Heller.

Answer 7

Wild: An Elemental Journey by Jay Griffiths.

More specifically: the sensual and descriptive section on the forests of Central and South America.

Answer 8

For the different and sweet, I have read out of The Bridge of Stars edited by Marcus Braybrooke (contains poems, prayers, blessings and meditations on a variety of themes).

I know you didn't ask, but for the different and sassy, I have read out of The Good Girl's Guide to Bad Girl Sex by Barbara Keesling.

Answer 9

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Answer 10

The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks.