How to keep your reading momentum going

It's the year of reading, haven't you heard?

So, why aren't we doing it?

Radio 4 had a segment each weekday morning where famous authors read from books they loved for a minute or so. It was sandwiched between the news and Nick Robinson asking the Green Party why they believe in trans rights.

That segment seems to have died a death, and we're not even halfway through April.

Not the world's most encouraging start to a national year of reading - and by god do we need it. The stats are fucking depressing: 1 in 6 adults in England and 1 in 4 adults in Scotland are considered to have poor literacy skills; one in five Britons aged 16-65 can only read at the level of a 10 year old which costs the economy £40 billion per year.

Mental.

But also: no wonder we got Brexit. Huge portions of the population struggle with literacy and the knock-on effect that comes with a lack of critical thinking skills.

Yikes.

Unlike Radio 4, I believe in both trans rights and that people should keep reading beyond the end of March, so I thought this issue, instead of discussing a couple of books, we'd take a look at some ways to keep those pages turning.

Don't compare yourself to others

People love to brag about how many books they read per day, per month, per year. Those people are idiots. Don't listen to them. If your kind of book is a Colleen Hoover, then obviously you'll read 100 of them a year. I challenge anyone to read 100 books at the level of The Odyssey. Exactly. So next time someone brags to you, firmly remind them that you don't read books for idiots.

Find the books you love and if they require it: take your time over them.

Find books you love

This is a skill. There's an overwhelming number of books published each year and it can be impossible to know where to start.

Here's what's helped me over the years:

1) You have permission to abandon books you don't like. Forcing yourself to read them will only make you hate reading.

2) Don't buy hardbacks. The pay off isn't worth it. An £18 hardback is two paperback books. Spread your bets.

3) Shop at local bookshops. These folk know their onions, and if you going in telling them what you've liked before, there's a good chance they'll be able to help.

4) Don't read reviews. If the review isn't by LRB, the New Yorker, the Atlantic, or Granta, don't read it. Stay off Goodreads. See above point about people being idiots.

The important thing is that you will get better at it. It might take a little time and it might take a lot of time, it's a real 'your mileage my vary' situation, but if you're reading 10 books a year and 7 of them are excellent, those are great odds. Trust your instincts. It will take you further than you expect.

Read dangerously

This has helped me more than anything else over the years. There was a campaign called A Year of Reading Dangerously and the idea was very simple: read books without reading the blurb. The blurb can help the average reader, but it will never give you a true flavour of what to expect and in the worst case it will put you off completely.

By abandoning the blurb, you stop choosing books based on how they're marketed to the lowest common denominator.

You really never know what you might discover from doing it. Some of my favourites over the years have been Girl Woman Other, The Sympathizer, Doxology, The Traveling Cat Chronicles (this made me ugly cry - on my birthday).

Read women, trans, and people of colour

Here's a shitty fact about the publishing industry: the people who buy the most books and who influence publishers the most are not the people on Booktok - they're middle class, older white women. They're the ones turning up to bookclubs, they're the ones buying new books, they're extremely engaged. It's the industry's worst kept secret that this demographic influences what gets published.

Bit by bit, this is changing, but in a way that's extremely weird.

You see, translated novels, novels by queer and trans folk, and novels by people of colour have a higher bar to clear than novels written by old white people (James Patterson, I am looking at you) so they are disproportionately better than the novels by old white people, because they're not reflective of the over all talent pool.

Higher barriers to entry mean only the really good stuff gets through.

It does mean that you'll have a higher chance of reading something that will blow your mind by these people than your average 'middle of the store table' at your local Waterstones.

Some recommendations

So, that's all well and good, but if you really don't know where to start, here are some recommendations. They're all sub 200 pages.

Human Acts - Han Kang

Her Body and Other Parties - Carmen Maria Machado

Romeo & Seahorse - Nikolaj Tange Lange

Open Throat - Henry Hoke

Love,

Storm