During your brief life in the world do you think you’ll have a better chance at finding the answers you’re looking for in a book or by pondering alone?
In my experience, neither.
Pondering is thinking, and thinking alone isn't really going to reveal anything in the absence of something to think about.
Books are written about someone else's experience. While the offer insights and give one something to ponder, someone else's experiences do little more than validate one's own.
Also what are the chances of your ponderings being exactly like what’s written in ink?
Some of them are. They're called journals.
That said, answers that I think you're talking about, in my experience, come through neither books or pondering. They come through experiences. Books can validate these experiences, and pondering these experiences can help one better understand them on an intellectual level. However, there are experiences that I struggle to wrap my head around intellectually, which would explain why I can't really explain them in words.