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Over the past few years, I've dedicated my column to trying to educate readers about journalists and journalism, explaining how and why we do what we do.
One thing I may not have mentioned: Journalists, as a people, are big proponents of literacy, which makes March is Reading Month a bit like Christmas to us.
That's why we, as an industry, donate to Newspapers in Education, which puts newspapers in classrooms so kids can learn about current events, practice reading, and use the newspaper in various projects.
One of my favorite experiences as a journalist was going back to my old high school as a Battle Creek Enquirer reporter and helping my eighth-grade English teacher and her students with a mock newspaper project.
This March, I want to suggest a few titles that might do a better job than I could teaching you about journalists, their process, their motivations.
Here we go:
∫ "All the President's Men," by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein
For many, many journalists -- including me -- this is the book that started it all.
Woodward and Bernstein were young Washington Post reporters in 1972 assigned to cover the case of a break-in at the Democratic headquarters at the Watergate hotel. The book, written by the two men but in the third person, documents their investigation, which ultimately connected the break-in to a pattern of election misdeeds directed by Richard Nixon's White House.
The book -- which reads like a spy thriller -- and the movie starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman made Deep Throat a household name and created the suffix "-gate" for every popular scandal, political or otherwise (the New England Patriots' Deflategate among the most recent).
I first watched the movie in an Intro to Journalism class my freshman year of high school, went straight to the library and checked out the book, and decided right then I wanted to be a journalist.
The book chronicles the efforts Woodward and Bernstein made to get to the bottom of the story, their struggles, their successes, their screwups. It's a real behind-the-curtain look at what reporting is like.
By the by, I have a copy of "All the President's Men" Bob Woodward signed after he gave a speech at Alpena High School several years ago. It's one of my most prized possessions.
∫ "Deadlines Past," by Walter R. Mears
Mears, an Associated Press reporter who covered presidential campaigns from John Kennedy through George W. Bush, takes readers through a series of his memories illustrating the ways both politics and political coverage changed over the decades.
One of my favorite scenes involves Kennedy coming to a hotel lobby for a press conference wearing swimming trunks, a button-down shirt, jacket, and tie. The press agreed to film and photograph him only from the waist up -- which would never happen today, for good or ill.
∫ "Ed Kennedy's War," by Ed Kennedy
Kennedy was an AP war correspondent during World War II and violated a military embargo -- a source's demand that news not be published until a specific time -- to break the news that Germany had surrendered to the Allies. His fellow reporters scorned him and the AP fired him.
The book, written by Kennedy but published posthumously by his daughter in 2012, describes Kennedy's experience covering the war, sparring with military censors, and ultimately deciding the people needed to know of the war's end as soon as possible, even if it cost him his livelihood.
∫ "Detroit: An American Autopsy," by Charlie LeDuff
This is not everyone's favorite book, and LeDuff, a Detroit News columnist who now runs an online news site, is not everyone's favorite person. He's been accused by colleagues of embellishing his stories.
So you have to take this book with a grain of salt.
But it is a great read about Detroit and working as a journalist in the Motor City during some of its darkest days. LeDuff lays out a great story arc about a body discovered in a block of ice at the bottom of an elevator shaft and how that led LeDuff to a series of columns about the city's overworked, underfunded fire department.
∫ "Into the Story," by David Marannis
While not entirely about journalism, this book by a journalist showcases some of the best writing produced anywhere -- and the writing appeared in newspapers.
Marannis, a Washington Post editor who also wrote a great book about Detroit ("Once in a Great City"), offers a collection of some of his best work on everyday America, on politics, and on sports, with personal recollections about how he tracked down some of the stories.
Justin A. Hinkley can be reached at 989-354-3112 or jhinkley@thealpenanews.com. Follow him on Twitter @JustinHinkley.