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"    Before meeting my current boyfriend, I went on some really, really dreadful dates. After a while, I became great at identifying, quickly, if the dude sitting across the table was worth seeing again. &amp;quot;What do you like to read?&amp;quot; I&amp;#039;d ask. Answers ran the gambit. I dated guys who read only the Beats, guys who adored Ulysses, guys who would die for George R.R. Martin. One guy, an ex-football player from Cornell who encouraged me to order a BLT when I told him that I was vegetarian, looked at me like I&amp;#039;d just spit up on the table. That response \u2014 complete confusion about why I had asked the question \u2014 was the one I learned to dread the most. I don&amp;#039;t mean to sound like a terrible snob, but the question of what (and whether) a guy reads offers important clues into whether he&amp;#039;s boyfriend material or *cough* fuck-buddy material. If a guy claims to &amp;quot;never read,&amp;quot; the fact that he believes that&amp;#039;s something worth bragging about is highly suspect \u2014 since when is being smart not cool? If he says he loves to read but struggles to find the time, that, on the other hand, is commendably honest. Of course, if the guy says he loves to read, reads all the time, AND his taste in books overlaps with mine, well, then I swoon. Bookwormy guys are my kryptonite. Truly, though, what he reads matters less than the fact that he does. Here are 8 reasons why. 1. Because sticking to a book, even when it&amp;#039;s a struggle, shows he&amp;#039;s capable of commitment. You can tell a lot about a person by how he reads. My ex-boyfriend was a terrific starter. Our first year together was the most romantic of my life \u2014 constant surprises, elaborate dates, love letters up the wazoo, rose petals leading from the elevator to our apartment door, etc. But after a while his efforts trickled off. I watched him apply the same initial energy to tons of projects \u2014 most of which he never finished. He loved books \u2014 he loved buying them, talking about them, and starting them. The armrest of our couch always had a book tented over it. If you investigated our bookshelf, you&amp;#039;d notice bookmarks popping out of half the titles. I&amp;#039;d always been dismayed by how easily my ex abandoned books (even the most page-turnery things, like Harry Potter). I think I should have taken that bad habit as a sign. &amp;quot;Where do you see us in six months?&amp;quot; I asked after five years of dating.  &amp;quot;I don&amp;#039;t know, babe!&amp;quot; he said, and kissed me on the head. End of conversation. 2. Because love letters, love letters, love letters. And emails, and texts. Remember the play version of Cyrano de Bergerac, the story of the big-nosed courtesan who writes letters to Roxane on behalf of her inarticulate suitor Christian? Roxane falls in love with Christian because of the beauty of his letters, but later, when she finds out that Cyrano has been writing them all along, she realizes that he is her true love. I have a sentimental habit of saving all the love letters written by boyfriends past. Every now and then, when I&amp;#039;m feeling nostalgic, I take out the ones written by an ex who was a seriously talented writer. It&amp;#039;s not because I miss him, but because the letters themselves were so beautiful. His writing vividly brings back the summer we road-tripped across the western United States in his dirty Volvo, the smell of Montana forest fires filling the car, that it&amp;#039;s like I&amp;#039;m there again. He always credited his voracious reading for his writing skills \u2014 this article on Life Hacker backs him up. &amp;quot;I love you,&amp;quot; plain and simple, is a powerful phrase that doesn&amp;#039;t need much embroidery. But the better your guy is at expressing his reasons for love, via snail mail, text, or email, the happier you&amp;#039;ll be. 3. Because detailed, creative dirty talk can be a huge turn-on. This goes hand-in-hand with reason No. 2. Dirty talk can be stressful. Sometimes it seems like there are three phrases, tops \u2014 especially when you&amp;#039;re in the sack and in that I-want-to-do-you-right-this-second frame of mind. But dirty talk can also be incredibly hot, especially when it gets creative. Reading improves your verbal abilities, and a guy&amp;#039;s way with words can be as impressive in the bedroom as a killer six-pack. If your guy is a reader, I bet he&amp;#039;s pretty good at whispering what he wants and how he wants it and exactly what he&amp;#039;d like to do to you. If you&amp;#039;re not big on dirty talk, just think about it like this \u2014 every book he reads will make him a better communicator in general. And good communication is the secret to every successful relationship. 4. Because readers are adventurers. I wrote about this a little bit in a previous post, but let me expand. That cheesy reading-is-a-journey metaphor has proved so durable because it&amp;#039;s true. Every time you open a book you take a trip \u2014 to a foreign country, another moment in history, even to someone else&amp;#039;s state of mind. A thirst for reading is the same thing as having a thirst for adventure. Every time he starts a new book, your guy proves that he&amp;#039;s down for something new, and that he wants to make his world bigger instead of smaller. Neuroscientists who conducted brain scans on readers noticed something fascinating \u2014 when people read scenes that are full of sensory detail (like the writing you find in novels), the same regions of the brain are activated as when people actually use their senses. Did your man just read a book about traveling to the Congo? He&amp;#039;s basically been there. 5. Because nothing brings you together like a book club for two.  According to Psychology Today, engaging in shared activities with your partner creates positive memories and strengthens your bond. (Not surprising, but it&amp;#039;s nice to have evidence.) No matter what you and your guy like to read, starting a book club for two is a great way to bring you closer. It might seem like you&amp;#039;re not really connecting when you&amp;#039;re snuggled on the couch reading the same book, but in fact, you&amp;#039;re creating the foundation for new conversations, inside jokes, and a bunch of shared references. Plus, you can learn a lot about each other by the way each of you reacts to certain scenes or characters \u2014 if you cry at the end of Anna Karenina and he throws the book at the wall, that&amp;#039;s the start of a dynamic conversation.  6. Because the book is always better than the movie. It is. It always, always is. Do you really want to fight about that with your non-reader boyfriend over and over again? If you date a guy who&amp;#039;s read The Fault in Our Stars too, you can go over every variation between movie and book plotlines afterward. 7. Because the more he reads, the better he&amp;#039;ll listen. I don&amp;#039;t know if Cornell football guy actually doesn&amp;#039;t know what a vegetarian is or if he just wasn&amp;#039;t listening, but after I explained that I didn&amp;#039;t eat meat and he suggested I have a BLT for dinner, I was a bit startled. We&amp;#039;ve all dated people whose gaze starts to wander if you begin a long story, or who are so intent on what they want to share that they completely gloss over everything you say. There is nothing worse than a guy who doesn&amp;#039;t pay attention \u2014 who doesn&amp;#039;t notice that you&amp;#039;re uncomfortable at a party, or freezing cold, or who claims to have bought you your favorite flower and then shows up with daisies, even though you&amp;#039;ve explained a thousand times that you love daffodils. Readers have good focusing skills. In order to follow a complicated plot or a theoretical argument, they have to read between the lines and pay attention to detail. Your boyfriend&amp;#039;s ability to detect nuances in novels and nonfiction will make him a better listener and better at reading your moods \u2014 tons of studies have proven that focused reading translates to higher empathy levels. 8. Because buying presents is hard.  The best part about dating a guy who leaves to read? No more panicking about buying him a present that he&amp;#039;ll love.  Follow Julie on Twitter. Photo Credit: Getty Images "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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