Reading More Than Before

It’s the dawn of a new year and you’re thinking to yourself, “Hey, the last two years were a shitshow. Maybe I should try Reading™?” Maybe you read my 2021 wrap-up yesterday and thought, “Okay, I can’t read 95 books but I could read some books. At least one book.”

You can read a book this year. Maybe more than one. I believe in you.

I’m planning to read 95 books again in 2022. As I noted yesterday, this is a challenge I fail to meet more often than not. This is fine. The idea is to set a number of books that will take some effort to read. For me, that’s 95. For you, that might be 10 books in a year, or just a single book. This is also fine. Pick a goal that is meaningful to you. It’s not a competition.

Maybe the idea of going for a raw number of books isn’t appealing to you. You might already read a lot and are looking for something different. You have options! How about a year where you read…

*X number of books in translation

*more books by BIPOC writers

*more books by queer writers

*a book from X number of different countries

*only books recommended by friends

*That Big Ass Book You’ve Always Found Intimidating1

…there is no wrong way to do this.

Here are the Rules

If you’re attempting to read 95 books this year, I welcome the company! If you’re also trying to mimic the format I’ve been using, these are my guidelines:

1. The reading challenge runs from 12:00am on January 1, 2022 to 11:59pm on December 31, 2022.
2. Any book finished within the challenge year counts.
3. A “book” is open for definition. My default is that if it has an ISBN, it counts. However…
4. If a book was lovingly hand-crafted for you as a one-off, or comes from a micro-press that only makes 12 lithographed copies of a book at time, it still counts.
5. There is no minimum page count.
6. Audiobooks count.
7. Comic books/graphic novels/comix count.

I’m really stretching it to seven rules. If you finish a book-like object in 2022, add it to your tally.

How do you read that many books in a year, you childless hipster? I don’t have time for this!

It’s true, I probably have more time on my hands than a lot of people. I don’t have kids, and as of quite recently I don’t have a paying job4. I live in a country with socialized medicine. But I did read 78/103 books last year while working somewhere that sapped me, so it’s possible to make a habit of reading in less than optimal conditions. Books and reading survive in the most impossible circumstances. Books and reading are things worth surviving for in impossible circumstances.

As for how you read a lot of books in a year, this is simple: a bit at a time. Sit down, open book, read for a while. I made myself a nest composed of a good chair and blankets and a ridiculous crocheted pouf for a footstool. There’s a basket full of notebooks next to me and a good supply of candy in the bottom of said basket for when I get peckish but don’t want to put the book down. It’s a nice place.

Why bother?

Reading defies the laws of physics in that time always expands when you do it. I never feel like I’ve lost part of the day or wasted my time while reading, even if a book isn’t what I hoped it would be.

Practically speaking, the volume and intensity of my reading is out of professional and creative interest. I’m a writer. I want to become a better writer. The best way to improve at this5 is to read as much, widely, and often as I can. I want to see how the thing is done and then how I can write in my own way. Whenever I feel lost in my own projects, reading someone else’s work always helps me make sense of own.

Every book I read is also a reminder that, however improbable it may seem, someone else might like your work as much as you do. Last year I read books about mushrooms, calculus, an alternate history of Marie de France, queer Canadian glam-rock romance, art heists, and cancer. I’m sure that at some point while writing those books their respective authors thought, “I don’t know if anyone is going to read this, but I want to write about it. I have to try this.” I read those books. You might read those books. Or you might read some other book that is the result of someone’s strange, ferocious, and particular obsession. So part of me reads in the hope of one day being read myself, that some unknown person in the future might be compelled by whatever my weird little heart’s song is and spend some time with it. Reading is an encouragement to just keep going. Do the thing. You don’t know where that effort may lead you.