Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Reading List

I like my little list of books I'm reading (see the right side of the screen). Someday I plan to connect that list to my books on Librarything, but as that does not seem to be likely anytime soon, I'll leave it how it is. I do wonder, however, at what point do you decide you are no longer reading a book? Or at what point do you take a book off the "currently reading" list? Some examples:

1. Middlemarch. I attempted to read this book. It was my second attempt. I got past page 30 this time, all the way to somewhere in the 100s. Unfortunately, it was still just as ungripping as the first time I tried to read it. Maybe it was because it was my toothbrush book* and I wasn't spending enough time with it. Maybe I needed to watch the movie or read a synopsis first so I knew what was going on. Whatever the reason, I gave up, and a few weeks later--when I realized I'd given up--I took it off the list.

2. Feeling Good. I start. I stop. I start. I stop. Luckily it's a self-help book, so the plot isn't all that complicated. I've read part of it in the past week, so it's on the list. For now.

3. The Wonder Spot. When I found myself halfway through the book and was still waiting for the plot to start I decided to read the last five pages and call it good. And I'm glad I did--I was still waiting for something to happen those last five pages. I think since I read over half of it, beginning and ending included, I'm going to list it as read.

The end.


*I have an electric toothbrush and find it an incredible waste of time to do nothing for 2.5 minutes at least twice each day. Thus I keep a book by my toothbrush so I can be productive during that time. Books with short sections are the best, while more involved novels, like Middlemarch... well, let's just say I don't get as excited to brush my teeth.

Incidentally, I keep books in the kitchen for the same reason--eating takes too much time. I just need to get some books on my iPod for washing dishes and doing laundry and I'll be set.

3 comments:

ol' Bob said...

From some book study web site: "Middlemarch is ... the great epic of nineteenth-century English literature, and comes closest to matching the success of Tolstoy and Turgenev's Russian sagas." That statement alone would be sufficient to keep me from opening the cover of the book.

Schmath said...

I tried to read that book too. I only read a couple of pages, and then it sat on my nightstand for several months until I cleaned my room.

Alicia said...

Books on your iPod are the best. The county library system has an amazing selection of books on CD. You can order them online and they deliver them to the closest branch. They even file them alphabetically in a nice room for you to pick up. Then you can just load the books onto your iPod and delete them off when you're done. I read several books a week this way and it makes some books much more entertaining than if I had read them myself.