The Insular Area of Reading Isles is a massive, genial nation, notable for its public floggings, vat-grown people, and smutty television. The compassionate, hard-working, humorless, devout population of 2.202 billion Reading Islesians are highly moralistic and fiercely conservative, in the sense that they tend to believe most things should be outlawed. People who have good jobs and work quietly at them are lauded; others are viewed with suspicion.

The medium-sized, moralistic government juggles the competing demands of Defense, Law & Order, and Education. Citizens pay a flat income tax of 33.8%.

The thriving Reading Islesian economy, worth 162 trillion Imperial Dollars a year, is fairly diversified and dominated by the Arms Manufacturing industry, with significant contributions from Beef-Based Agriculture, Door-to-door Insurance Sales, and Woodchip Exports. Black market activity is frequent. State-owned companies are common. Average income is 73,726 Imperial Dollars, but there is an enormous disparity between incomes, with the richest 10% of citizens earning 426,669 per year while the poor average 6,064, a ratio of 70.4 to 1.

Military spending is on the increase, Leader has no checks and balances after the upper house was abolished, the airship business has been driven out of the country by strict regulations and high fines, and a handful of megacorporations own every "craft brewery" in the nation. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Reading Isles's national animal is the Island Doggo, which is also the nation's favorite main course.

Reading Isles is ranked 9,879^th in the world and 2^nd in Literature for Largest Insurance Industry, scoring 5,847.11 on the Risk Expulsion Effectiveness Rating.