Buddy Doyle likes to read in bed.

He was doing just that, late one night, when he happened upon a paragraph in Stephen King’s memoir  “On Writing” about how most people have a favorite place to read. For King, it was a blue chair in his study. King’s words validated something that Doyle, a freelance photographer from Gardiner, had been thinking about for a while – a book of photos that showed people reading where they love to read.

Doyle blurted out, “That’s it,” woke up his wife and spilled his bourbon nightcap. He changed his sheets and went to sleep. But the next morning, he began his quest: to find Mainers where they read and document the moments.

The result is Doyle’s book “Where Maine Reads,” featuring photos of 50 Mainers in places where they read or would love to read. The photos show people reading in a bathtub, a fire station, a brewpub, at the beach, in a park, at a library, in a camper and out in the woods. He found authors, politicians, Maine celebrities, clergy and a host of other people, from teenagers to retirees, who agreed to let him into their private reading space. The photos are accompanied by essays, in the subjects’ own words, about what they read and why.

The book goes on sale this week, and Doyle, 76, will appear at a book launch event at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Print: A Bookstore in Portland. Proceeds from the book will benefit Maine Public’s children’s literacy efforts. The book itself could promote reading and the exchange of ideas, by showing the diverse interests and habits of people from all over Maine.

“It’s really humanizing and intimate. It allows people to make a connection with other Mainers and their experiences with books,” said Samaa Abdurraqib, executive director of the Maine Humanities Council, who was photographed for the book in a comfy chair in her Brunswick home. “I imagine the book will allow people to learn about other aspects of people’s lives. It adds dimension to people’s lives.”

IT WAS ALWAYS GOING TO BE A BOOK

Doyle, who is also a graphic designer and substitute teacher, first came up the book idea when the Lithgow Library in Augusta asked him to design a logo for its 125th anniversary in 2019. As part of the library’s celebration, Doyle came up with the idea of photographing people reading, and the photos were used in a series of magazine ads promoting the library.

When the promotion was over, Doyle did not want to let the “where people read” idea die.

“I had always intended for it to be a book; I just wasn’t sure how to do it,” said Doyle.

So he began looking for ways to create the book and organizations to partner with. He pitched his proposal to several Maine libraries that politely declined. A friend suggested he pitch the book idea to Maine Public, which runs public TV and radio stations around the state.

Maine Public liked the idea, especially as a tie-in to its literacy programs, and agreed to be the media sponsor, promoting the book. Doyle secured the Maine State Credit Union as the major financial sponsor.

Specifically, money raised from the book will help fund Maine Public’s literary tours, where the network arranges for Maine children’s authors to meet and talk to kids at libraries around the state. The tour last fall featured Jamie Hogan, Chris Van Dusen, Lynn Plourde and Scott Nash. The next tour, in November, is scheduled so far to include Karen Toothaker, Jean Flahive and Matt Tavares, plus Plourde, Hogan and Van Dusen. Libraries on the next tour will be located in Augusta, Windham, Wells and Lewiston.

“It just made a lot of sense for us to be involved. It ties in well to the work we do to support literacy,” said Scott Marchildon, vice president and chief development officer for Maine Public. He added that the network would promote the book on TV, radio and social media.

BATHTUBS, BLEACHERS AND BACKYARDS

Doyle, a native of New Jersey who moved to Maine in 1999, found his subjects in a variety of ways. Some were people he knew or worked with. Others were notable literary Mainers – including authors Paul Doiron, Monica Wood, Richard Russo and Lily King – who he found with help from the Maine Writers and Publisher’s Alliance, the Maine Humanities Council or by just searching online.

He asked his longtime friend, humorist Gary Crocker, to be in the book. Crocker, who is partial to the poems of Robert Frost, mentioned he sometimes reads in the bathtub. So that’s where he was photographed.  The tub in his West Gardiner home happens to be in a space that used to be a bedroom, so it’s large and comfortable, with lots of windows, a TV and a recliner.

“I read in there more in the fall, because I can look out at the pretty leaves,” said Crocker, 76.

The essays in the book sometimes include what the photograph’s subject likes to read, some personal history or general thoughts on what reading means to them. Crocker, who grew up in the small, rural community of North Monmouth, talked in his essay about how books allowed him to discover the wider world.

Sometimes Doyle literally drove to places in hopes of finding a reader to photograph. At one point, he realized he had no photos from Bar Harbor and thought a book like his should have one. So he drove to the town’s Jesup Memorial Library to see if he could find somebody.

While there, he saw a man walk into the building wearing a bike helmet and carrying a bag of books. That man was David Einhorn, a retired company lawyer for Jackson Laboratory and an avid reader. Doyle talked his way back to Einhorn’s house, where he photographed him reading in an Adirondack chair with the ocean in the background.

Chaplain Phillip Dow, of the Maine National Guard, is seen in the book reading in the back of his pickup truck in Albion. He told Doyle he sometimes pulled over in the woods and read in the back of the truck, because he loved the quiet.

Rabbi Erica Asch of Temple Beth El in Augusta was photographed reading the Talmud at her daughter’s soccer game in Hallowell. She said she thought “it was a great idea” to photograph people reading and ask them about reading.

In her essay, Asch explains that she has a Talmud with her in the bleachers at her daughter’s soccer game because she practices Daf Yomi, the reading of one page of the Talmud every day, which takes more than seven years to complete. She started in 2020 and has read her page a day in cities all over the country, in hotels, in cars, at soccer fields.

On the page next to her essay is a photo of the 1943 novel “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” by Betty Smith, which Asch says is one of her favorites, something she first read as a pre-teen. Growing up in southern California, the world of Brooklyn in the early 20th century seemed intensely different and interesting.

“The main character was probably my age (early teens), and it was just such a beautiful depiction of that life,” said Asch, 46.

In his essay, Russo said he likes reading on his balcony, with a view of Portland Harbor, because it helps him connect what he’s reading to where he is and what else is going on in the world.

“If I happen to be distracted from whatever I’m reading, I can look up and there it is – a particularly lovely manifestation of the real world. That’s the thing about reading, though. In the hands of a really good writer, life on the page is every bit as real as what we generally refer to as real life. That’s why we read. Not just to escape reality but to inform and deepen it.”

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