Meet The Members
Who We Are
Iderasa Ademoyo
I live in upstate New York. I am a senior majoring in Biology and minoring in African Diaspora Studies. I don't recall the exact age I started reading, but I know that my appreciation for reading outside the classroom began in middle school. My teachers and peers noticed my outward love for reading so much that they nominated me as the class bookworm. I don't believe I ever 'stumbled' upon reading. My father instilled in my siblings and I at a young age that reading helps acquire knowledge, so it became a norm in my household. Off the top of my head, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Audre Lorde, Chinua Achebe, and Frantz Fanon. One of the first books I fell in love with in middle school and still love today is 'How To Kill A Mockingbird'. I also love 'Zami: A New Spelling of My Name' and 'Things Fall Apart'. Unfortunately, I do not read as much as I used to, especially since college life has progressively gotten busy, but on average, I read one to two books a year and a plethora of online articles/short stories. I hope to meet new people, have conversations about unique works/books, learn from everyone, and re-kindle my love of reading outside the classroom. I am bilingual but aspiring to master some more languages!!
Rebecca Newman
I grew up in New York City. I am a first year Theatrical Production Design major with a concentration in design. I started reading after much practice and difficulty at age 8 in 3rd grade. I decided to join this book club because I love to read but have yet to be in a proper book club and want to experience one. My favorite authors include Shannon Messenger and David Arnold. Some of my favorite books are My Name is Mina and I love the Night by Neil Gaimen and Without You,, There Is No Us by Suki Kim. I read anywhere from 200 to 30 books per year. I hope to make some friends and discuss in depth about some books. I have never had a pet animal but I do have younger brothers.
Kayla Shenk
I am from Mohnton, Pennsylvania and I am a freshman at Ithaca College, majoring in Occupational Therapy and minoring in Communication Disorders. I started first reading when I was about 3 or 4 years old when my parents first introduced me to reading. I have decided to join Book Club because I love to read so much and I would love to share my passion with others who also have a passion for reading. My favorite author is JK Rowling, which also means that my favorite book, or in this case, series, is the Harry Potter series. Typically, I will read around 15 books per year on average. I hope that being part of a literary community will help me explore new themes and topics that books cover that allow me to explore more interests that I have when reading and how themes connect. In addition, I am excited to meet everyone who has similar interests as me. Something fun about me that I tell a lot of people is that I finished the whole Harry Potter series in 7 days (1 book each day).
Laura Ilioaei
Hey! I'm Laura, a native New Yorker and current junior double-majoring in English
and Communication Studies at Ithaca College. I started reading as soon as I was able to decipher text on a page as a first-grader. After reading my first book, I picked up another, and another. For much of my childhood, it wasn't uncommon to see me nose-deep in a novel. My favourite author is Haruki Murakami. His way of connecting the metaphysical with the real world without being too fantastical, all while illustrating the vibrancy of even the most introverted unoriginal everyman is incredibly profound to me. Yet ironically while I do reserve a spot on my shelf for him, none of his titles rank in my top five favourite books. (In that case, you'd find Machiavelli's Il Principe, Marie Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorain Grey along with "The Importance of Being Earnest," and Robert Greene's The Art of Seduction.) The number of books I read per year vary. I don't set book goals because it's more important to read actively as opposed to passively, and book goals don't account for density and length of text. Imagine someone telling you that they only read one book in two months, but it turned out to be the 1000+ page behemoth that is Victor Hugo's Les Miserables and upon reading it, they've been enlightened about some aspect of human nature. I'm more impressed by that than someone reading a handful of books and treating it like a chore to reach a quota. I'm looking forward to being a part of a literary community because it's one place where I don't need to justify why I'm a literary nerd. I can just vibe with other fellow bookworms and wriggle over to titles I wouldn't have ever thought to grab because it was recommended to me.
Fun fact: I love turtles. 🐢