Falling Back in Love With Reading

For the first 75 days of 2025, I am doing the “75 Hard Challenge”. This is a challenge to improve your daily routine with better eating habits, exercise, and much more. A neat aspect of this challenge is you can either follow a premade routine or make your own — I chose to make my own challenge. 

Part of my personalized challenge is reading for 10 minutes every day. So far, I have only read one book and I’m 30 days into this challenge. But it’s made me appreciate reading as a hobby again. 

When I decided to add reading to my 75 hard, I proceeded to go hard at Barnes & Noble. I will fully admit I bought too many books — I walked out with nine. I got all different types of books to keep my mind engaged, so nine might be reasonable. 

“Go Ask Alice” by Anonymous, “Wicked” by Gregory Maguire, “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood, “Fahrenheit 451” by Ray Bradbury, “The House of My Mother” by Shari Franke, “The Third Gilmore Girl” by Kelly Bishop, “Bad Feminist” by Roxanne Gay, “The Most Famous Girl in the World” by Iman Hariri-Kia, “A Reason to See You Again” by Jami Attenberg, and “The Virgin Suicides” by Jefferey Eugenides were my selections for that Barnes & Noble trip.  

I started with “The House of My Mother” by Shari Franke. In a nutshell, it’s a memoir about Franke’s adolescent years spent on camera for her mother’s YouTube channel, 8 Passengers. Franke was inspired to write this after the arrest of her mother, Ruby Franke, and Jodi Hildenbrant in 2023 after the discovery of the two youngest children of the family were found in an abused state. 

Franke shares how her “awkward teen years” were captured for over 3.5 million people to watch as well as things that weren’t seen while the camera was off. It is a powerful story about religious abuse and social media having negative impacts. 

Starting with this book made me fall back in love with reading. The story didn’t necessarily make me want to read more, but the realization that reading is comforting. I like to read at the end of my day so I’m doing that instead of doom scrolling social media for hours. 

My nighttime routine now consists of a cozy blanket, a warm drink (or my leftover Alani Nu I forgot about), and my book.  

Since I’ve started reading again, I have felt a sense of ease in my lifestyle. I now have something comforting in the busy life of school, dance, work, and anything else that may pop up. 

So, if you need me, I’ll be reading. 

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