What are your reading habits?

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bigkingfan91

Well-Known Member
Mar 1, 2014
190
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WV
This has probably been done before, and I apologize if it has, but I haven't seen it talked about recently so I thought I'd ask..
What are your reading habits? When do you prefer to read? Where? How much time do you usual preserve daily for reading? Any habits you've formed while reading? Nicotine while reading? Snacks, drinks?
For me, lately I haven't been very busy as far as after work and weekends go, so I've devoted an awful, awful lot of time towards reading. I haven't been a member here long, and I started back reading right when I joined the site. In that time I've read Doctor Sleep, Carrie, Full Dark No Stars, Lone Survivor, Helter Skelter, Duma Key, Cell & Joyland. I just started Under The Dome about 3 days ago and I'm 400 pages in, paperback Part One I might add.
When I have to work, I usually get up around 5 or 6 am now and read for 3 hours or so until I go in. I love reading right when I get up for some reason. If I have no real plans I usually get home, shower, eat and read again, sometimes up until I go to bed, sometimes i'll take a break and read again before bed. A couple of times recently I've read from around 6 pm to 11 pm. Honestly I'd rather go slower and let the stories last longer but some books just can't be put down. The hours go by sometimes without you even paying attention to them.
I had just started getting back into reading and writing when I joined here, so I had missed a ton of King's more recent work, so I thought I'd try and catch up on everything I missed after Cell, then read Joe Hill's work, and eventually re read the older King classics. Some of which I haven't even read, or I did attempt to but they went over my head as I was much younger. Happy we have 2 new novels coming out this year!
 

Grandpa

Well-Known Member
Mar 2, 2014
9,724
53,642
Colorado
Most of the stuff I read is business materials. Next would be magazines, Discover and Time being two favorites, and newspapers. Then books, but my business efforts keep my time so broken up that it's hard to dedicate to a book. I'm trying to read books more now, taking Mr. King's and many, many others' advice that you can write effectively unless you read consistently.
 

HollyGolightly

Well-Known Member
Sep 6, 2013
9,660
74,320
54
Heart of the South
I must be getting old. These days when I read for any extended amount of time I get sleepy! :down:
Me too! The days are so full of work, house chores, meals and child raising that by the time I get in bed to read, I fall asleep about 30 mins in. That is why it took me 2 years to get through the 7 DT books. I've been reading Little Sisters of Eluria for 3 nights now and it's not very long. Life is hard.
 

Bryan James

Well-Known Member
Apr 3, 2009
5,150
7,644
South Cackalacky
My eyes are starting to reverse, so if I read in bed I have to take off my glasses.

I wake up with papercuts and legs-a-drippin' (need to cut toenails; I fight when I sleep and need lotsa preventative pillows).

Sucky books have ended up in shreds about my little man enclave, so I don't read in bed anymore.
 

skimom2

Just moseyin' through...
Oct 9, 2013
15,683
92,168
USA
Depends on how much reviewing I'm doing (since those are not read for pleasure, I don't count them). If it's a lot, my brain is full at the end of the day (lol), so I watch more TV before bed. If I'm reviewing little, I read A LOT, and everywhere. I've even managed to read in the shower and while washing dishes (and have had to buy more than one or two library books because of it :p). I find that when a story is brewing in my head I have a HUGE compulsion to read--don't know if I'm tanking up or if it's a way for my mind to start working at story construction.
 

Walter Oobleck

keeps coming back...or going, and going, and going
Mar 6, 2013
11,749
34,805
I read every day. I don't keep track of how much time I read and if I have other chores I try to do those first. I've discovered that the one time I don't read...although I have reading material...is when we're on vacation. I'll read on the plane if that is how we travel but once there I rarely read...possibly early morning if my wife is still sleeping, have this light I can clip to a book or the kindle. Mainly fiction although I've read memoirs, non-fiction. I also make indexes...something I've been doing for almost thirty years, sheets of blank paper folded triple and the index quality varies. I'll index fancy phrases...character names...ideas...and the indexes can run to five pages front and back. With some indexes I'll convert them to a Word file while other indexes are left in the book. With the kindle you can highlight a word or whole passages and you can access those 'notes' either on the kindle or at a page at Amazon and do with them what you will. I read in the kitchen...where I am in the avatar photo...at the peninsula section, bar-stool...or in the living room, although I've also read in a parked car, plane, hotel room, tree stand, deer blind, truck cab. I've read 30 titles this year...just over 100 last year...an unfathomable 180+ in 2012...125 the year before. At another site I keep track of what I've read, have made 'reviews' there that are really not much more than notes to my self although if others find them helpful I'm down with that. I also look at other reviews there for suggestions of what to read next. I've many favorite authors. I do re-read...and index again if I really like that story.
 

mustangclaire

There's petrol runnin' through my veins.
Jun 15, 2010
2,956
12,726
52
East Sussex, UK
I have to be careful when I read. I only pick up a book if I have a clear evening because once I start I actually can't stop. Doctor Sleep took me three evenings. I'm a bit like that with a lot of things. Packets of biscuits. Bottles of wine. Just one page won't do and 100 is never enough. I puff away on my e-cig and often have to re-read passages because I go far, far too fast. And (I know I'm not alone with this) I can actually feel bereft when I've finished a book. So sad that it's over. I've been known to plan simple dinners that are quick to cook so I don't have to put that book down for too long.
 

bigkingfan91

Well-Known Member
Mar 1, 2014
190
921
32
WV
I have to be careful when I read. I only pick up a book if I have a clear evening because once I start I actually can't stop. Doctor Sleep took me three evenings. I'm a bit like that with a lot of things. Packets of biscuits. Bottles of wine. Just one page won't do and 100 is never enough. I puff away on my e-cig and often have to re-read passages because I go far, far too fast. And (I know I'm not alone with this) I can actually feel bereft when I've finished a book. So sad that it's over. I've been known to plan simple dinners that are quick to cook so I don't have to put that book down for too long.

I can be the same way! I like the thought of taking a story slow and letting it really last but it rarely ever happens. Some are just pure page turners, and i'll whizz through them like it's a movie lol. If I'm reading in the evenings sometimes ill dread stopping for supper, like eating gets in my way lol. In the morning when I get up super early to read I won't even bother, i'll just read for 3 or so hours and then eat. Reading too fast used to be a big problem for me when I was younger, I think that's why so much went over my head. It is tough when they're over, I hate that feeling!
 

The Nameless

M-O-O-N - That spells Nameless
Jul 10, 2011
2,080
8,261
42
The Darkside of the Moon (England really)
My reading habits - mostly before bed. Not always, but probably around 80-90% of my reading is done in bed. I don't think I have ever read as soon as I wake up.

The times I read during my normal day, I don't think I ever eat while reading. Naturally being English, I enjoy a cup of tea with a book.

I tend not to read too much in a day, about 30-40 pages is usually my dailly limit. When I do get a book or a section of a book that I just want to contiually read the next page, such as Joyland, parts of 11/22/63 etc, I sometimes can read upto 60, maybe even 70, but I am not a very fast reader so they come in big sessions.

One thing is an absolute must, if I am to take in what I'm reading, and that is silence.
 

VampireLily

Vampire Goddess & Consumer of men's souls.
Jul 25, 2013
1,469
8,829
New Jersey
i am about to throw myself into the fire by openly admitting that currently, i am reading..."Petals on the Wind" book 2 in the "Flowers in the Attic" series by V.C. Andrews.

Why? Because i have not laid eyes on these books since 7th grade and i want to see if it was just as awesome as i remembered. The new tv movie had been released about a month ago and it was, to put it lightly, heinous. "This is NOTHING like the book!" i groused. "The dialogue is awful.... it's SO TWILIGHT! What a bunch of trash."

Guess what? It was EXACTLY like the book, nearly matching it word to word. All my friends thought that woman was a regular Shakespeare.... reading it now makes me cringe and then burst out into wild giggles.
 

EMARX

Well-Known Member
Feb 27, 2009
2,970
15,757
i am about to throw myself into the fire by openly admitting that currently, i am reading..."Petals on the Wind" book 2 in the "Flowers in the Attic" series by V.C. Andrews.

Why? Because i have not laid eyes on these books since 7th grade and i want to see if it was just as awesome as i remembered. The new tv movie had been released about a month ago and it was, to put it lightly, heinous. "This is NOTHING like the book!" i groused. "The dialogue is awful.... it's SO TWILIGHT! What a bunch of trash."

Guess what? It was EXACTLY like the book, nearly matching it word to word. All my friends thought that woman was a regular Shakespeare.... reading it now makes me cringe and then burst out into wild giggles.
I've done that on a few occasions and had much the same reaction. Then I ask myself. What were you thinking??