Remember The Reader by Bernhard Schlink? Originally published in Germany in 1995 it went on to sell, after an Oprah push, over two million copies in the U.S. and became the first German book to top The New York Times bestseller list. It focused on an illiterate German women with a Nazi past who seduced a younger boy so that he may read to her.
Well here is a new twist on the intriguing theme.
The sign above recently appeared in the window of a bookshop in London. Andrew Bailey suffers from the degenerative disease Friedreich’s ataxia and has been unable to read for the last 15 years. Finding that audiobooks began sounding ‘too robotic’ Bailey took to asking for help in finding someone to read to him.
What he didn’t expect was the sudden outpouring of support with “dozens of offers of help.” You see someone passing by the bookshop snapped a picture of his plea and posted it on Twitter and it quickly went viral, being retweeted over 1250 times.
His wish list includes 100 books he would like to have read to him including My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult and The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend. He also wants to hear books by Charles Dickens.
What a great story.
More:
Dozens offer to read books to blind man after carer’s advert in bookshop window was spotted and posted on Twitter | Daily Mail
Blind man Andrew Bailey’s reader search goes viral | BBC