The Reading List

How long is it since I started reading multiple books? I need to look this up. Thankfully it will have been recorded in Nelly's Garden.

[checks blog]

Aha! I first mentioned it EXACTLY five years ago. This is why I blog.

On Friday, March 08, 2019, I posted this, 

For several months now I've been reading 10-12 books simultaneously. I was inspired to do this by Will Self, who in answer to the question,

What are you reading currently?

Replied, 

Before I read digitally, I’d be reading perhaps 10 books simultaneously – but now I read as many as 50 at once...

I still don't read digitally and I've never went as far as fifty books. That would be beyond me. Also, I.ve never read Will Self. So far, never felt the need.

I have kept a list of most of the books I've read this past five years and it numbers 199 which does not seem a lot. Forty books a year. At that rate if I live to be 90 (which I'd quite like to) I'll only be able to read another 800 books. Some of those will be re-reads and some still to be written. 

My current favourite reads are The Bee Sting and The Age of Innocence. 

All-time favourites Louise Kennedy - Trespasses and Claire Keegan - Foster. Recent favourites Wally Lamb - I Know This Much Is True and Barbara Kingsover - Demon Copperhead. 

March Reading

My practice of reading several books at a time is working well. Now if I begin a book I almost always finish it and my night table is no longer piled with unfinished tomes. If I buy or find something new it has to wait until a space opens. The idea originally came from Will Self who claims to read 50 or more books at a time. That would be daunting - a dozen works better for me.

I finished The Salt Path by Raynor Winn this morning and added Shuggie Bain to the reading basket. I've had Shuggie for a few months now. Bert read it first and really liked it. He is a slower reader than me but he raced through it. Zoe told me that she read it quickly as well. It's at the back of the pile so I'll probably not get to it until Friday at the earliest. Something to look forward to.

I didn't expect to enjoy The Salt Path as much as I did for Raynor Winn writes honestly and her descriptive powers are mighty. It was as if I was there with them. She had me longing to walk the Undercliff when John Fowles did not. Guess I'll have to make do with Portglenone Forest.

March Reading List

For several months now I've been reading 10-12 books simultaneously. I was inspired to do this by Will Self, who in answer to the question,

What are you reading currently,

Replied, 

Before I read digitally, I’d be reading perhaps 10 books simultaneously – but now I read as many as 50 at once...

This intrigued me. I don't read digitally apart from journal and newspaper articles so thought that 10 would be a good number to start with. So far it has worked out well.

Since embarking on this project I usually have ten on the go, never more than thirteen. I have a system (I love systems) where I aim to read three of the books every night. If there is time, and there usually is, I read three in the morning. That way each book will get picked up every other day or so.

When a reading session is finished one book is retained, the one I am most eager to go on with, and two will be returned to the back of the queue and two picked from the front for the next session. This method has increased my reading dramatically and I have completed more books in 2019 than I'd normally read in half a year.

The books are a mixture of fiction and non-fiction and there is normally a couple of very light reads among them. These light reads are not necessarily the most enjoyable but I usually persevere.

Currently, I'm reading twelve books, fiction by Charles Frazier, Esther Freud, Kate Atkinson, Patrick Ness, Toni Morrison, Anna Burns, Sebastian Faulks and Matthew Thomas and non-fiction by Stephen McGann, Suki Kim, Edward Stourton and Catherine Simpson. Stourton is the light read. I may not finish it.


Half of the books are from the local library, one is a new book (Milkman) and the other five are second-hand. I got Jazz in Amsterdam.  Varina and Human Traces I'm reading after Bert. He loved both. Almost finished Hideous Kinky and have just begun Simpson and McGann. 

  I should return to this theme in a few weeks time so that we can all see how I'm getting on. One more thing, I should add a previously read book to the mix. There are novels on my shelves I've had since I was sixteen years old. I'm sure some of them could bear another read. After all, there must be some reason I've held on to them for half a century.