if you know he's reading a book, check out the book-title, and google a summary of the book at home
next day: "hi, I see you are reading this book, I also read it and liked it" (please check before if the book is not retarded

also no spoilers, say you read it a while ago, so you don't need to know all the details).
if you are shy, that's no problem, if you are nervous and he notices this, he will know you are interested (because you are just not starting a neutral conversation), so that will only be to your advantage

I would find it awesome if some girl or women I don't know would start talking to me and blush.
in general, from the many (many many!) doubts I had approaching other people... none of the attempts I regret. I don't think one conversation was a waste. Maybe you get along, maybe not. Starting a nice conversations is never a waste.
Of course, advice of other people on an internetforum will never create your own will-power to actually do it, this you have to do for yourself. But you can trust my advice that you wont regret it.
Good luck
edit: also, don't overthink this situation, don't plan too much in advance (i.e. like everything you are going to say), just think about one line or topic to start the conversation, the rest of the conversation will follow and will 99% not be how you planned it. You can't plan these things in advance. The worst thing you can do if you want to have a nice talk is to plan everything you are going to say.