Black Mass was the first book I bought in the summer between my Freshman year of college and Sophomore year. I heard about this movie coming out and wanted to get ahead of it to see if the book was truly better than the movie. During that summer I picked up twelve books that were all movies or TV shows. I would go to Barnes & Noble and buy a new copy of these books, not crease the spine, and then read and return each one within the two week return period. I pretty much used Barnes & Noble as a library and the two week return policy forced me to finish them quickly so I was cranking through them. This was the summer that started my addiction with reading and I haven’t stopped since. Black Mass fit the bit with all the categories I loved: mobsters, FBI investigations, a powerful mob boss in Whitey Bulger, and oh yeah this was all a true story. This was also the first exposure to a book being way better than the movie. I read the book first and ate up all of the little details of the investigation and was so excited for the movie with Johnny Depp. Now I didn’t hate the movie at all. But as I was watching it I was like wow it is true: books are just better than the movies they are adapted into. I think what makes this painfully true is that our psychological feedback loop for rewards makes us so satisfied when we read a book whereas a movie is force fed to you. In a book you are meant to chew every bite and sometimes pick at your teeth when pieces get stuck. You’d rather eat a piece of steak than have Guy Fieri cook one and scream at you right? And like I said I love movies so therefore I like Guy Fieri, but man you can’t beat a medium-rare steak you cheffed up yourself. That’s reading.