On the Compatibility of Bookworms (Because It Is Valentine's Day, After All)

Love it or hate it, today is all about love.

So what better time to talk about the role of books in relationships?

When I first met the man who is now Mr. Bookworm, I despised him. No, really. I believe the adjective I used to describe him was "frat-tastic" (which, to be fair, he was), while I prided myself in thinking I was anti-establishment and therefore anti-Greeks. Then he lent me his well-loved copy of Love in the Time of Cholera. I have it on my shelf still (well, I suppose they are our shelves, but I have a hard time relinquishing possession), complete with the scrap of purple cardboard he'd been using as a bookmark when he finished it and passed it my way. Though it is probably an overstatement, I'll refuse to budge on my claim that this book is what turned our uneasy friendship into a relationship.

And look, five years later (has it really been that long?), we're married.

Is it too much to contribute our entire relationship to one book? Probably. I'll admit I no longer despised him by the time he lent me the book; I'll also insist that knowing that he'd spent his summer reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez painted an entirely different picture of him in my mind. But even more than that, this book provided a starting point, a launching pad, if you will: we both loved books, and we both loved talking about books. From Love in the Time of Cholera to the Wheel of Time series, we'd found a common ground.

One of our very first dates - you know, the all-day kind spent with no true plan in mind - was spent at the Strand, which was a major test for me. I hate to be crowded in a bookstore, followed, hurried, or generally interrupted in anyway. In hindsight, it was probably a stupid place to go on a date. But realistically, I could not spend my life with someone who did not know and appreciate my bookish habits, whether it be the books I read or the way I pass the time in a bookstore.

I lucked out: we were (and still are) compatible bookworms. He even took me to see the original manuscript of A Christmas Carol right before he proposed. Outside of classics and science fiction, our reading tastes vary greatly: he reads science books, fantasy novels, and casually flips the pages of Milton on the beach, I read primarily literary fiction with a smattering of memoirs and historical novels here and there. But when our reading does overlap - whether because I've begged him to read something new or by pure chance - we slip right back into the conversation we had that first summer in Washington Square Park.

Ok, enough sappy stories about me and my booklovin' husband. What about you? Could you or do you maintain a steady relationship without some common interest? Without a common interest in books? Is there one book that has such strong memories associated with it for you?