From Occasional to Avid Reader: How to Read More Books

After spending some time exploring the cyber world and going to book events, I began to question how much of a 'reader' I was. It was intimidating to discover book-bloggers claiming to gobble up whole books in a week, a weekend, or a day. Meanwhile, I'm sitting over here in the corner with the same book I've been reading for the past month thinking, quietly, 'I like books, too.'

I love books, but as a kid I hated them. For the longest time, I was not in love with reading, but I was in love with those few books I'd finished. I wanted nothing more than to be gripped and pulled in by the unforgiving jaws of a tremendous book, but I was forever at battle with the motivation to turn off the television or get off my laptop and dedicate some solid quiet time to reading. This was a difficult task for me, so if the aforementioned 'gripping' didn't take place within the first five to ten chapters, that book was dead to me.

But, I'm a writer, shouldn't I be reading to learn about my craft? Putting in those much-needed hours to better understand the complexity and wonder that is a good book?

I, for a long time, disregarded the very good advice that reading would make a better writer out of me and, instead, opted to spend my time writing rather than reading. I thought practise would make perfect. It can, but I didn't realise I'd become trapped in my own habits, making the same mistakes over and over again because I didn't know what I didn't know.

When I decided I needed to broaden my reading horizons, I wasn't really thinking about writing, I was simply thinking I would not fall in love with more stories if I didn't read any. And falling in love is what I wanted, dearly. Jaw gripping, gnashing love.

I started with a year, and within that year I had one goal: finish every book I started. And how many books did I read that year?

Six.

I read six books. It's not like I'd counted in past years, but this hurt. I'd read a book every two months, technically. It was not impressive, but I did it. I finished every book I started. With this, I quickly realised how often I'd given up on good books because I didn't read beyond chapter five. I was also letting the size and complexity of certain books intimidate me and, thus, missing out on some spectacular stories.  

In the following year, I tackled a bigger challenge, with the ever-wonderful Goodreads. I set up an account and, much to my horror, found I'd read less than a hundred books in my lifetime. Devastated by this knowledge, I set myself a goal of fifty books for the next year.

To be honest, I thought I would fail. I'd struggled to finish a book a month, so one a week sounded impossible. However, the thought of having an extra fifty books in my arsenal (even the bad ones) was all the motivation it took not to care, apparently.

I won't pretend I went from six books one year to fifty the next all thanks to a fairly unrealistic goal. It didn't make everything else fall into place. But from a big goal, I made smaller ones. Fifty books in a year meant one a week, with a little wiggle room to catch up. Since I write in the mornings, I thought I may as well dedicate the afternoons to reading. I made this decision based on how low in energy and productivity I am after work or, in case of weekends, after my brain is fried from writing. I didn't realise I was developing and maintaining a routine, but upon reflection, that was the best thing I could've done for myself.

As well as a routine, I established a place to read in the house that didn't include a television. When I read, I only ever needed my book, so I sat outside every afternoon, after I'd eaten dinner and changed out of my work clothes. It wasn't a concern at the time, but I think it did more for me than I realised to have my reading place separate from my writing station. Writing took place inside – where I always had access to a charging port and writing supplies, in case I needed to switch to longhand. When I sat outside, I knew it was time to read, and God help anyone who tried to talk to me.

At the end of the year, I'd read sixty-four books. It was the best thing I'd ever done.

Here's a quick list of the positives that came out of this experience:

1. I finished books I would've given up on in the past, and loved them.
2. I finished books I would've given up on in the past, and didn't like them, but I still learnt from them. There wasn't a single book I read that I regretted finishing, even the ones where the endings made me mad.
3. I gave second chances to books, series, and authors I hadn't previously enjoyed and, out of that, I discovered some of my favourite books, series, and authors.
4. My love of books (and my collection) expanded.
5. Television disappeared from my thoughts and downtime without my even feeling bothered by it, or missing it.
6. I went from having a couple of favourites to having a whole list.
7. I'd found so many books I loved, that I then had a list of new releases to look forward to in the coming year.
8. I read genres I wasn't all that interested in, with delightful results.
9. I became the person my family/friends went to for recommendations.
10. I learnt something from every book (even the bad ones).
11. The more I read, the more I wanted to read, and the more excited it made me about reading.
12. It made me a better writer.

Here's a quick list of the negatives that came out of this experience:

1. I spent a lot of money on books, but I'm cool with that.

In this one year, my writing went from 'okay' to 'wait, I might actually be good'. Not only because I actually became better but because I could now actually recognise what was good and what was bad about my writing. It felt like I'd learnt more in that one year than I had in the many I'd spent just 'practising'.

When I ignored the very good advice that 'reading makes you a better writer', I think it was because I didn't understand it. I didn't realise how much I had to learn from books. I thought practise was the best thing I could do for my writing. I didn't understand why it was good advice because I hadn't read enough books.

For those like me, or previously like me, or who knew this was good advice from the beginning but are interested to see what I learnt, here is my third list of this post, stating all the wonderful benefits I gained from reading more books.

1. I discovered paths I had never considered before because I had no previous exposure to them. I would like to emphasise this for plot but it applies to all the elements of storytelling; characters, setting, foreshadowing, twists, relationships. I felt like I'd been given a whole new set of tools I didn't previously own. I didn't realise how much I didn't know.
2. I found more of what I loved in books (and what I hated). This helped me understand the mistakes I was making in my own writing and what more I could be doing to make my stories better.
3. I quickly came to learn the new clichés– ones I didn't know existed (because they change) and ones I was definitely 'overusing'. I'd like to state that there is nothing wrong with clichés. Sometimes they are useful. However, as I was devouring book after book, some elements became tired very quickly, and I realised I was terribly mistaken when I thought I was being original. An important lesson, although a difficult one.
4. I learnt through example and found elegant ways to write the parts I hate to write. No matter how many times I tell myself I love every aspect of writing, there are scenes and transitions I come to that I just don't want to write and often the words fall into my head: if you don't want to write it, nobody will want to read it. Reading helped me understand that something interesting can come from what you think is going to be boring. It also taught me that even if it has to happen, it doesn't always have to be written. I get in this awful habit of feeling like I have to show the reader every single thing that happens. But I don't. Take a fight scene for example. Even though they are always 'high-intensity' they aren't always 'highly-riveting'. Even as a reader, sometimes I want to skip the back and forth. Just tell me who wins, please.
5. I found faults in my own writing because there's nothing more unsettling than reading something you find awful or unnecessarily confusing or difficult or boring or overdone or cringe-worthy and realising you do the exact same thing.
6. I fell in love with characters and storylines and magic and developed an enormous bank of how to approach the fundamentals of writing in my own work.
7. I questioned my prose, and also relaxed about it. There are certain ways of wording common actions, or some phrases, that I have purposely avoided for years because they are overused. I thought it was lazy or boring. I would constantly get stuck thinking 'there's a better way to word this sentence'. I learnt sometimes it's better to go with the easiest, quickest path. I learnt this by reading good books by good authors. When they used basic wording, and it worked beautifully, I realised I was doing more damage obsessing over prose than if I just went with the obvious choice. My favourite thing about reading books written by authors that are better than me is that I realise they are human, and if it's good enough for them, it's good enough for me.
8. I sometimes got overwhelmed thinking 'this writing is so much better than mine, I'll never be this good', which is false, because by reading books from authors that were better than me, my craft grew, and grew quite naturally, just from filling my head with the words of others.
9. I got ideas. SO MANY IDEAS.
10. I built my vocabulary, which feels like it shouldn't be number ten because ten should be boom, impact, but it's true. Words acquired. Boom.

Becoming an avid reader made me a better writer, and fuelled a small flame passion into a roaring fire. The only downside, however, was how much of my paycheck was spent on books, and book boxes, and book merch, but when you get to see all those glorious books organised on your shelf or stacked on the bedside table or simply on the floor because you've run out of room, are you going to be mad?