Hello Evandro, I don't know how advanced your knowledge is in terms of English grammar. The answer to this question can be very technical and I do not want to get you confused. The word READING in your sentence is a gerund. A gerund is a noun and it is used when we need to speak about the action represented by that verb: Smoking is bad for your health Exercising regularly can help you live longer These are two examples of very common sentences in which you use TO + GERUND: I look forward to hearing from you. [preposition TO + gerund] They are looking forward to meeting you at the party. [preposition TO + gerund] But we cannot say: I look forward to hear from you. [INCORRECT] They are looking forward to meet you at the party. [INCORRECT]

just to add to that, in case you were wondering; 'a guide to read..' doesn't make sense at all.. so it's not just grammar, it's meaning too. :)

You got it right Evandro. It is similar to the use of the infinitive at the beginning of the sentence. But in reality that is not an infinitive. Actually, it is not a verb. It is a noun. The confusion comes from the fact that both the infinitive and the noun are spelled READING. In Spanish: The noun derived from the verb read is LECTURA. This is the translation of the sentence into Spanish: Una guia para la lectura de las grandes obras de la literatura universal It is not "una guia para leer" (infinitive in Spanish), it is una "guia para la lectura" (noun: in Spanish this type of nouns is called Sustantivo Derivado because it derives from a verb). In English the verb READ becomes a noun when you write it as READING.