reads

1. 1
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of read.

   The teacher reads aloud to the class each afternoon.

   Whenever she travels, she reads two novels on the plane.

   Note

   The present-tense form that often takes a text, not a person, as its subject. A sign reads "Closed," a sentence reads awkwardly, and a will reads as follows. In these uses the subject is the thing being read, and the verb reports its wording or the impression it gives. With a person as subject, it can also name an author directly: she reads Dickens means she reads his works.

   The note on the door reads "Back in ten minutes."

   The second paragraph reads more smoothly after the edit.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of read.

   Detective novels make for satisfying reads on long trips.

   Her two reads of the ambiguous poem differed completely.

   Note

   A plural that gathers very different things under one spelling. Readers swap good reads, meaning books worth reading. Analysts compare their reads of a situation, meaning interpretations. Geneticists assemble sequencing reads, the identified stretches of bases in a genome. The surrounding words usually settle which is meant: reads of something are views, reads on a shelf are works, and reads from a sequencer are data.

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