Reading advice Archives

I read a lot of books. If you notice, most days on this blog are devoted to book reviews. This happened to be the rare day when I had no finished books waiting for review. Last year, I read 219 books. It’s an occupational hazard of book reviewers! I’m not bragging because I know a number who read more. Equally, I know a number of very happy people who love reading who have read far less. What’s important is that you find enjoyment and enrichment in whatever you read. Here are some things that help me make the most of my reading time.

Eliminate distractions. This is the biggy! When you read, read. I always read better when my smartphone is plugged in somewhere else. Don’t try to multi-task, especially with loved ones.
A good reading location. This means a chair that offers comfort and support and good light (neither to dim nor too glaring. If you are an older reader, you probably need more light, unless you’ve had cataract surgery. I like it when I can rest my book on a table, though the binding on books don’t always lend themselves to that.
Good eyewear. My eye doctor learned I read a lot and gave me a prescription for reading glasses in addition to my regular glasses that include a reading prescription. This has so improved my reading experience.
I always have several books going at a time. Partly this reflects reviewing where this allows me to have a book I’ve finished most days. The other thing is that I tend to want to take a break after reading a stretch in a book, usually about 30 pages of non-fiction and 40 pages of fiction.
Take stretch breaks between books. For me, it’s a way of clearing my mental palate. As readers, we also need to move our bodies. Usually, I don’t read more than 30 to 45 minutes at a stretch without getting up, maybe doing a household chore or two or at least refilling my coffee cup or water bottle.
Read when you are most alert. Sometimes a half hour nap or walk perks me up enough that my mind is refreshed. You don’t read much when you are nodding off–usually the same paragraph ten times.
Reading expands to fill the time you give it. And usually with little difference in comprehension. I can read 30 pages in 30 minutes, or 45, or an hour. I find that if I am determined, I can do it in 30, and sometimes less if I focus. Often we are slowed by distractions or going back over what we’ve read. This will vary, of course with the density of what we are reading–not only the words on the page but the complexity of the ideas. Sometimes a skim to get the outline of a plot or argument followed by slower reading helps with dense material.
Reading with others. Recently, a friend mentioned wanting to read Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age–a significant book coming in at over 900 pages. I have too, and we decided to tackle it together, beginning April 1. I’ll let you know how it goes. Book clubs do the same thing with more people. The ones I’ve appreciated most are those where we get into books we’ve wanted to read, often ones that have sat on the shelves of some of us.
I usually have a series or two and a good one will spur on my reading. Right now, I’m reveling in the Brother Cadfael stories as well as Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion series. These are just great fun! Louise Penney’s Gamache series got me through the years of the pandemic–allowing me to lose myself in her writing during those grim times.
When you find a writer you like, read all you can by them. I find the more I read such writers, the more I get “in sync” with them, whether it is Wendell Berry’s essays, or Willa Cather’s fiction, my discovery of last year. When I discovered David McCullough, I read everything by him. I miss him.

Those are some of the things that have worked for me. If they don’t work for you, we’re just different. I think all of us who love reading live under the awareness of “so many books and so little time.” Some of what I’ve written here falls under making the most of our reading time so that we might read a bit more of those books. But another part of what I’ve written relates to getting the most enjoyment and enrichment out of our time. If that is happening when you read, you are reading enough. And don’t let anyone tell you any different!

Question of the Day: What advice would you give a younger version of yourself about books and reading?

I asked this question recently at my Facebook page and as usual got a wonderful variety of answers. I’ve been thinking a lot about that question and would have to say my response reflects how fortunate I’ve been to be exposed to books early in life and encouraged by parents and many others who read and shared that love with me, an influence that continually enriches my life as I read.

I would begin by reminding my younger self of how fortunate he was to have such access to books, booklovers, libraries, and friends who loved to talk books and opened doors to authors and subjects that further enriched my life. I would urge my younger self both to not take such things for granted and to “pay it forward” and be that person for others, and to advocate for greater access to literacy and the stuff of literacy–books of one’s own, libraries, hearing books read aloud, and being that person who delights in hearing what a younger friend is reading.

While I profited from recommendations from others, I would tell my younger self to refuse to let people “should” on you when it comes to what you read. Often the books that others said I “should” read were disappointing. The better guide that I’ve learned is, “does it pique my interest or answer a question or discuss a subject I care about?” Especially use this in evaluating the books “everybody” are reading.

It took me awhile to figure this out, but I learned that when I found a writer who really spoke to me, to get ahold of as much of what they wrote as I could. C.S. Lewis was probably the first such writer, but over the years, I’ve practiced this to great benefit with the likes of Eugene Peterson, David McCullough, Ron Chernow, Anne LaMott, Marilynne Robinson, Louise Penny, and Frederick Buechner, and others.

Conversely, I wish I’d learned to set aside authors who disappointed me. It’s not that there weren’t profitable things in them, but there was more in others. What’s worse is to go back and get disappointed again. Fool me once…

I would say to my younger self to be more selective in keeping books you’ve read. Now I have to cull through all that old stuff that no one wants. I’ve learned to get rid of most new books once I’ve read them while others still want to read them. Bookstores tend to pay you more for the new stuff. Take instruction from those sale bins in used bookstores and remember how many of those books everyone was reading five years ago…and now no one wants them.

Perhaps this goes without saying but I would urge you to be more careful about the books you let come home with you in the first place. You had the illusion that you could read them all eventually. I’ve had the task of getting rid of books that I wondered, “why did I ever buy that?” or concluded, “I will never read that.” Especially be wary of books on “contemporary issues.” Most have little staying power.

I would tell you that as much as you loved (and still do) canvassing bookstores, that you should get more of your books at the library. Especially those of contemporary concern. Some are important. But the good thing is that they don’t cost anything other than the taxes you pay and the library wants them back so you don’t have to figure out how to dispose of them!

This probably goes for much of contemporary fiction that is also a “one and done” proposition. If it’s amazing enough that you’d really want to re-read it, then buy it. I’m glad to own the works of Steinbeck and Stegner, for example, because they reward re-reading.

I’m glad when I discovered the benefit of reading hard but important books with others. I think of books I struggled with when I was younger that I would have gained far more from in the company of others.

I’m glad for Goodreads and this blog as a kind of journal or book log to remember what I’ve read. I only wish I’d developed that habit sooner. To my younger self, keep a book log, even if it is only a title, an author and a sentence or two about what the book is about.

If I go further in this vein, you might get the idea that I am pretty down on my younger reading self. That’s actually not so. Those younger selves so richly furnished my life with the books you read that I am profoundly grateful. I could not begin now to read the many good things you read over the years. Some I may get to re-read, but more I will remember–the season of reading everything Churchill wrote, the summer reading Calvin’s Institutes.

I am so fortunate to have been surrounded by so many who loved books and reading–mom and dad, Mrs. Smith who taught me to read, Sarah, Ray, Doug, Sue, Terry, Barney, Larry, a couple of Bobs, Jim, Tom, James, Dan, Byron, all those in Dead Theologians and our Smoky Row Book Groups and all my online friends at Bob on Books. Of course one cannot forget all those who bring us the books–writers, publishers, booksellers and librarians. A reader cannot be too thankful!