I realized something the other day. The worst of it is, this isn’t the first time I’ve had this same epiphany. I need to read more. Reading is to writing as food is to energy in the human organism. If you don’t eat, you’ll feel listless and tired. If you don’t read, your writing will suffer.
This morning I got up, started coffee, fed the cats, and watered the asparagus fern over the sink. I stared into space for a long time. My mind is wrapped up in food and projects for Christmas and the words weren’t there. The cats, licking their chops, retreated to beds in the office and I followed while they curled up for naps. I stood there, staring at bookshelves, and the stack of books on the corner of my desk, thinking about collecting (I am a book dragon and my hoard is books? No? But it sounds so much better than compulsive book collector!). I have been rebuilding my library, which was much reduced from years of moving and pruning to keep it fitting into the moving boxes and loads. In this house, I am putting down roots, cheerfully, and that meant finally having the library I want.
Still, I’m not reading enough. The books going on shelves are largely unread. I’m wondering, this morning, just when I’ll get around to reading them if I don’t manage reading like I do writing and, oh, exercise. I track the latter on an app, and the former on a spreadsheet, and perhaps it’s time to set reading goals, as well. As a lifelong reader, reading feels like an indulgence I should earn, the equivalent to chocolate after a bad day. Don’t get me wrong – I am reading! – just not in paper much these days and paper is where all my research books are. Most of them.
I suppose I can live with not reading them until I’m in the throes of research. Some of them aren’t actually meant to be read through – which didn’t stop me when I was younger and life was less complicated and allowed more time for such things. Those I can shelve with a free conscience and take down as needed for some prickly identification query.
Then there are the books that are treasures, and even as I contemplate the need to read so I can weed, they are always going to be safe.
Still, I do need to find time for reading, and given my schedule? I think I’ll add that to the daily Pomodoro timers as well as the writing. For one thing, with ebooks that enable me to read anywhere and any time, paper forces me to find a comfy spot, possibly with a blanket, and a cuppa… Oh no, please don’t throw me into that br’er patch!
Mad Genius Club 
19 responses to “Reading time management”
Bwahahaha! “Kin you jump out?” If I can jump out of my reading hole, it’s not deep nuff!
Oh, that’s why I buying more books! To complete my reading fort!
I read a lot, but the majority of it is Twitter, web forums and social media.
I need to change that.
I have been actively seeking out blogs (Substack has a lot of that energy these days) written by interesting people with something to say. Twitter I do mostly images, and don’t read, and same for most other social media these days.
I’ll have to look into that.
I’m thinking I also need to put together a reading list and go at it as well. I’ve got two kindles, a Boox Tab, and my cellphone has the kindle app on it. Between that and Project Gutenberg I should be able to bring in a ton of first for the mill. Just need to actually do the prep work and do it.
It’s not like I don’t have time to read. I’m just mostly reading zippy junk these days.
Oh, I read some junk, too. Sometimes it’s even for research!
There’s never enough time to read everything I want to.
Too many books, not enough life. But I can try!
Ever since I had a stroke, I have had trouble with being able to mentally focus on reading for any length of time. It gets even worse when the book is challenging to read like the one I am reading now “A Curse of Krakens” by Kevin Hearne. This series has some complex worldbuilding, mostly in the first book which I read before I had a stroke. Now it is the different viewpoints that the story is being told from. His earlier books were written mostly from a single viewpoint and were urban fantasy. Still, even with less complex books I have trouble these days.
Oooh, I see you have a copy of Ursula Vernon’s “Digger”. That was a great webcomic, and I was saddened to see it end. My print copy is the multiple-volumes version. I should check to see if she’s done anything else like it.
Try *Castle Hangnail*.
Same here. I don’t read nearly as much as I should to refresh myself.
There’s too much to do as I look at my sadly-neglected garden. And mountain of sewing. And of course my own writing and business.
What *also* makes reading harder is I notice every clumsy sentence construction, unneeded word, or badly chosen word. This takes much of the fun out of falling into someone else’s dream.
Yup. Once you start to edit your own writing, the editor hangs about.
We’ll have less to read if this lawsuit goes against Internet Archive.
https://twitchy.com/amy-curtis/2023/12/16/internet-archive-n2390878
My ADHD, depression, and the fact that reading is mostly work for me (proofing public domain pulp) sometimes work together to keep me from reading more than a chapter a day. Which, in any given pulp work, is a very small amount of reading indeed.
All I’ve been reading lately is fanfic; I need to get more variety in my literary diet.
I write at least one book review every week. That means I have to read at least one book a week. Actually several because if I don’t think I can recommend the book I don’t review it. Plus pleasure reading and research reading on top of that. It is a good thing I am widowed and the kids grown and out of the house, because I’d probably neglect them with all the reading I do.
Fortunately I am a fast reader. I can get through a novel in a few hours. Nonfiction usually takes longer, but I can go through them in a couple of days unless we are talking about a 1000+ page doorstop. If that’s a review book, I generally take a couple of weeks, using some books whose reading I stockpiled earlier.
I love the book dragon analogy and am straling it. 😀
Try “book wyrm,” too