A recent Friday expedition on an uptown F train found not a single Kindle, iPad or knickety-knack Nook in sight.

Two young ladies, one clutching her canvas shopping bag, the other with a smart pageboy haircut, were instead reading the ultimate fuck you to the e-reader, the original ambiguous literary doodad: a jacketless hardcover book.

“Feel it,” said Pratt student Chelsea Dowell, about her bare-skinned copy of The Enchantment of Lily Dahl. “It’s sturdy and formidable. Jackets on hardbacks don’t look nice. And I like my book to look good.”

Dowell said she even has no intention to own an e-reader. She instead has bookshelves upon [...]