I am reading too many books at once! I knew I was getting into dangerous territory when I realized I was reading multiple books from the same genre, and I recently checked and realized I’m reading at LEAST 12 books at the moment, which means it’s time for…
*drumroll*
A reading cull!
If you’ve read my post about mistakes you can make when polyreading, you’ll know that having a limit to how many books you’re cycling through can be a good way to make sure you’re *finishing* books, rather than just starting new ones all the time. I tend to find that if I’m reading more than a dozen books simultaneously, it’s probably because I’ve grown cold on some or I’m reading too many in one genre, and I either need to consider DNF’ing them, or I need to set them aside and focusing on *one* book in that genre until it’s done. So let’s take a look at what I’ve got going on currently:
WRITING-RELATED BOOKS
– 20 Master Plots
– The Artful Edit
– Your First Page
– Daily Rituals: Women at Work
– Hooked
This is where the bulk is, I see. I started a whole bunch of these books at various points in the last few months, because when you get excited about a writing book, it’s VERY hard to not jump right into it. BUT—some of these are more relevant to me at the moment than others. Hooked is the one I’m most engaged with at the moment, so I’m going to focus on that one to finish. 20 Master Plots I’m pretty close to finishing and find pretty interesting, so I’ll hammer that one out next. I’m going to table Your First Page—it’s good, but I think I want to read this one closer to starting the rewrite of my novel, since that’s when it’ll be most effective to have it fresh on my mind. The Artful Edit I’m going to table for now, too, because I really like it, but I think with all the rewriting work (which is essentially a total redraft), I’ll need this later in the year, so it might be a good summer read for me to get me in the editing mindset. Daily Rituals is actually a delightful book, and even months after starting it, I find myself thinking back on various examples from it. So I would like to finish this one. I might be able to tuck this in my purse for those pesky waiting-room moments, because each entry is short, it feels almost like reading a dictionary, so I can bang out a couple of them at a time while in line/etc. But this will be lower priority.
FICTION
– The Odyssey
– A Court of Thorn and Roses
– Middlemarch
– When I Was Lost
– Skull & Laurel
Well, these are all quite a bit different aren’t they! I don’t feel like any of these are particularly competing with each other, because they’re all in a specific lane. For example, I read Middlemarch at bedtime. I read A Court of Thorn and Roses (which I’m annotating for a friend) when the boys are settling down into their beds at night. The Odyssey is an audiobook that I listen to while doing dishes/other tasks around the house. The one place I need to look at is When I Was Lost, which is a short fiction collection, and Skull & Laurel (magazine). Both are quite enjoyable, but I’ve been focusing on magazine reading lately, so I haven’t picked up When I Was Lost as much as it deserves. It won’t take long to finish, as I’m probably about half-way through, so I need to just focus that one for my short reading, and I’ll come back to Skull & Laurel after.
MISC
– Monstress Vol 1
– The Creative License
– LifeStyled
Poor Monstress! It’s not because I’m not enjoying it that I haven’t been reading it lately; it’s because I read it on the iPad and I haven’t been using the iPad much at all, since the boys tend to abscond with it. I need to either borrow it from our local library if they have it, or I need to buy my own copy so I can make progress. It’s delightful, so I wouldn’t mind owning it. We’ll see.
The Creative License is about art journaling and getting back into art at any age. I’m really enjoying it, and it’s governing a lot of my Hobonichi daily art, but I need to just chunk through it and try the exercises and keep making progress.
LifeStyled is an organizing/decluttering/life-coaching book from the author of Minimalista, which I quite enjoyed. I enjoy her newsletter, too. I’m probably about 2/3 through it now, and while I liked Minimalista better, I do find LifeStyled interesting. And it’s fun looking at beautifully organized spaces.
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So the final line-up looks like this:
– Hooked
– The Odyssey
– A Court of Thorn and Roses
– Middlemarch
– When I Was Lost
– Monstress Vol 1
– The Creative License
– LifeStyled
I’m going to try to do these Polyreading Notes updates again, because they really hold me accountable to what I’m reading and help me keep track of what I’m finishing, too! Last year, I feel like all my finished books got lost in a haze, so this year I’m trying to keep a little better score.