my reading process

Note- I published this one on my original blog on March 22, 2016.  The following post is identical to what went up on that day save for some formatting adjustments to the footnotes.

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Hi,

The following post is NOT the running post promised for today.  Sorry...it's coming Friday, I swear.

This post is a little different from what I've done so far.  It is mostly descriptive- I'll just take you through my reading process in full (*).

*However, it will be extremely familiar to those who are just here for the tangents.

The reading process covers five steps- finding books, getting them into my hands, prioritizing the next book to read, taking notes, and tracking the ones I've finished.

The idea behind sharing my process is to help anyone who is looking to get more out of their reading.  What usually helps me build any process I am working on is to look at other examples.  These examples tend to give me enough new techniques to implement in my own process and generate enough new ideas for me address unresolved issues.  I hope that someone can read this and do the same with their own reading process.

Before we begin, a couple of other quick admin notes.

1. I am going to post on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule starting next week.  It will only be a temporary thing while I work out the words from Friday's post on Lost In Translation.  Each post will go up sometime between 11am and noon, as always.  The Tuesday-Friday setup will resume once I am through with that book.

2. I'm currently experimenting with different blog layouts over on my former space (afullblog.wordpress.com).  The debate is whether to make the past posts more visible on the first page.  For now, the menu is in the upper right hand corner but slightly hidden- you need to click on the square button with three horizontal lines to bring up old posts.

Without further ado, then...

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*I. Finding books

(Note: you can skip this section if you routinely stop reading books that you start.)

Here is a non-complete (but fairly exhaustive/exhausting) list of the ways I find books.

Part one- books I'll read without research- books in the following categories are immediately added to my list:

-> New releases from these authors: Tim Harford, Atul Gawande, Haruki Murakami, Chuck Klosterman, Bill Simmons, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, George Saunders, Malcolm Gladwell, and Michael Lewis

-> Gifts (*)

-> Anyone's first-ever recommendation

-> Recommendations from people with strong prior recommendations

-> Books I choose to re-read

*Mentality also applies to fireball shots- if you buy it for me as a gift, down the hatch it goes...

Part two- books I will research first- I find these by the following methods:

-> Walking around a bookstore/library

-> Going to someone's house (having been invited in) or peering through a living room window (having not secured an invitation) and having a look

-> Recommendations from people with poor prior recommendations

-> Books mentioned on another media source- podcasts, other books, blogs, etc (*)

*Podcasts I listen to in order of preference- The Football Ramble (four hilarious guys talk nonsense, occasionally soccer), Men In Blazers (two hilarious guys talk soccer, occasionally nonsense), More or Less (about the misuse of statistics in the media), Common Sense (a not very partisan look at politics + current events), The Bill Simmons Podcast (covers sports and pop culture), The Memory Palace (short stories 'about' history but not necessarily a history podcast), Hardcore History (same host as 'Common Sense', looks at history), EconTalk (economics, both in everyday life + higher level), The Moth (live, true stories from all over the world), Love and Radio (intimate interviews/stories about all kinds of topics ), and Start Up (about starting a business).  Just subscribed to 'Reply All' (a podcast 'about the internet')

Blogs I read- Brain Pickings (via a Sunday newsletter, covers anything that might enrich your inner life), Farnham Street (via a Sunday newsletter, covers anything that might enrich your outer life), and Mr. Money Mustache (covers the 'why' question about understanding personal finance, might enrich your bank account)

My first research step is to find the book on goodreads.com.  I look for a rating of at least 4.0 (out of 5.0) and set a higher standard if the topic is not to my current set of interests (*).

*At the moment- memoirs on grief/loss, books about writing/the creative process, anything that claims to explore 'the soul' or something like that

If the rating is sufficient, I consider the likelihood that I'll still be interested in, say, a month (which is likely the earliest I will start a book I am currently 'researching').

Finally, I apply the 'Chuck Klosterman Rule' (*)- how long is the book?  My rule of thumb at the moment is that if the book is 200 pages or less, I immediately request it- otherwise, I'll add to a list for later.

*It might be fun to guess what this means before I explain- OK ready? 

The rule is a reference to a comment he made on Bill Simmons's podcast last October regarding the length of things- the basic gist of his comments was that he often stopped doing things that were taking too long (such as reading a 600-page book) but he never stopped doing anything because it wasn't taking long enough.  Using this rule has been a revelation- given the choice between reading more topics or more detail about one topic, I prefer the former.

As I touched on in the note at the top of the section, the only reason I go through a filtering process is because I never stop reading a book once I begin.  If you are the type to immediately stop reading a book that is not quite up to snuff after a few chapters, you probably do not need to think so much about a filtering process for the books that you are considering.


*II. Getting books

(Note: you can skip this section if you don't mind sitting around with nothing to read.)

I maintain two piles of books- one for books that might lead to thinking and one for books I can read before bed.  Almost everything starts in the first pile (*) but I transfer it to the second if I determine there will be no note taking.

*Recent exceptions- the Animorphs series, the Harry Potter series, generally all books explicitly about sporting events, all Chuck Klosterman books

Once I start the final book in a given pile, I go into my 'to-read' list and look for the next book(s) to pickup.  Unless I already own a copy of the book (applies to 2-3% of what I read) I request it from the library.  I generally request books I want in groups of six to twelve because I cannot guess what will come in right away and what will take a month (*).

*Back when I had a proper job, I made requests on Monday morning for pickup at the nearest Boston public library branch- by Saturday, there would be enough arrivals to go on reading for a few weeks.

Popular, new, or rare books required additional time on my 'active' request list.  Over time, I settled on changing the pickup location to one of the two 'main' libraries- Cambridge Main (near Harvard Square) or the Boston Public Library (at Copley Square)- for these books.  I do this because main branch libraries are open seven days a week (unlike local branches) and for longer hours (when compared to the local branches).  This extra availability gives me the best chance to pickup the book before my reservation expires (usually five to seven days) (*).

*I tried to think of a good analogy for waiting a month to get a book, then not being able to get to the library in time to pick it up before your reservation expired.  The closest I got was to falling asleep on the train and missing your stop- but this unrealistically assumes you waited a month for a train that runs to Downtown Crossing.

Since I now go to a library almost once per day, I no longer worry about the above- I just request books as I feel up for it at whichever library seems more likely to get it in for me first.


*III. Prioritizing books to read

(Note: you can skip this section if you incapable of reading more than one book at a time.)

I guess this is where 'the fun starts'?  I referenced two piles above- let's start with pile #1.

I generally read more than one book at a time.  I do this because I'm often not in the mood to read something for too long on a particular day.  In these moments, I want to turn to another book, not start a completely different activity (*).

*It reminds me of writing- having multiple projects going at once allows you to work on something else if you get when you get stuck.  Otherwise, you might drop the ball (point pen) completely and suffer a severe case of writer's block.

That said, some of the books I read are best described as 'hard work'- which means I almost never feel like reading them. I try to only have one of this type at any time (currently Human, All Too Human by Nietzsche) and I will space out the reading into even blocks so that I will finish over the course of a couple of months.  Such books are the first thing I read each day (since I am mentally freshest and can look forward to the more entertaining books I'll read later).

Once the hard work is over, structure tends to disappear.  I try to have one fiction book (currently 100 Years of Solitude) and one book that I am actively taking notes on (A Sand County Almanac) but no requirements beyond those.

My 'last book'- the book I keep at the bottom of my pile- should be long enough to read over multiple days while I wait for library requests to come in (currently, a collection of Martin Luther King Jr.'s speeches).  Next month, I will probably move this up to be my 'hard work' book and use another big book as my 'last book' (something about architecture, I forget the name).

Pile #2 has two criteria.  First, will I need to take notes?  Answer must be no.  Second, if I fell asleep while reading, would I lose anything valuable?  Answer must also be no.  Any book that match these criteria gets transferred into pile #2.

Currently, this pile has two books- Rap Year Book and Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs.  I read one chapter of Rap Year Book then switch over to Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs until I fall asleep.


*IV. Taking notes

(Note: you can skip this section if you read strictly to entertain yourself.)

I use a three-step system for retaining ideas from the books I read.

Step one is to note as I read the sections I will review further upon completion.  I write down the page number and, if applicable, add extra identifying information about the part I want to return to on an index card.

Step two is to review the sections I noted on my index card.  I'll then write down any thoughts or reflections in a word document or email. After I work through the entire index card, I bring the book back to the library.

Step three is to review my typed notes and reorganize them into a coherent summary.  This occasionally takes on the form of an essay but more often ends up just being my notes grouped together.  When applicable, I might label these blocks with a theme from the book.  These themes might make connections to other books, speculate on how they interact with other ideas I have been exploring recently, or just contain reflections on what I liked.

Here is an example of steps one and two from a book I've already referenced on this blog- The Checklist Manifesto.  My initial index card has about thirty-five specific page numbers and paragraph indents for review (*).

*I do this by writing notes such as '35.4' or '67.1'.  These mean page thirty-five, indent #4 and page sixty-seven, indent #1, respectively. Some books are written in ways that are more difficult to note- I get around this by making more complex notations.  Example- '68 (Today)' might mean page sixty-eight, sentence that begins with 'today'. 

Sometimes, I include in parentheses a section that might help clarify what I want to learn from a different section- so a note such as 88.2 (91.3) means I will go to page nintety-one, indent #3 and read that before considering what the note for page eighty-eight, indent #2 should become.

Let's use the text from page 168, paragraph indent #2 (168.2).

First, I read the section again.  Here is the quote:

' "Maybe", he said. But he put it into surgical terms for me.  "When surgeons make sure to wash their hands or to talk to everyone on the team"- he'd seen the surgery checklists- "they improve their outcomes with no increase in skill.  That's what we are doing when we use the checklist." '

I briefly consider this quote and I write the following:

A good checklist improves outcomes without necessarily improving the skill level of any individual involved in the process.

If I went on to step three, I might use that quote in an introductory summary at the top of my notes page or find other similar ideas to list alongside it (*).

*I intend to post my final book notes for 'The Checklist Manifesto' at some point in the near future so we can actually see the final product. Stay tuned!

Here is an example of book notes that I turned into more of an essay form- Beyond the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo.

The book was a little different than I expected, but not in a negative or unenjoyable way. In short, the story followed the daily lives of the people covered so closely that very rarely did I get the larger, global picture, so to speak, of the subject.

But toward the end, this one page passage seemed to tie it all together in such a clean way that I decided to just copy this down instead of noting down what caught my eye on the other 250 pages.

‘At Annawadi, everyone had a wrong he wanted righted…but the slum dwellers rarely got mad together- not even about the airport…Powerless individuals blamed other powerless individuals for what they lacked. Sometimes they tried to destroy one another. Sometimes, like Fatima, they destroyed themselves…they improved their lots by beggaring the life chances of other poor people…In the age of global capitalism, hopes and grievances were narrowly conceived, which blunted a sense of common predicament. Poor people didn’t unite; they competed ferociously amongst themselves for gains as slender as they were provisional…the rich, occasionally rattled, remained unbreached…politicians held forth on the middle class…As the poor took down one another, the world’s great, unequal cities soldiered on in relative peace.’

 Once the book notes are in their final form, I save them into a google drive folder for sharing.

The most important point I have to make about book notes is to experiment with different methods.  From my experience, completing the book and returning to key sections works better than stopping as you read to compose coherent thoughts.

However, this might not be the case for you.  Whether you mark parts for re-reading as I do, stop to take notes as you go, or devise your own new system is entirely up to you.

You will not know what will work best without trying different things, however.  Again, the idea is not to replicate what works for me because what I am trying to get out of a given book is likely very different from what you are trying to get.  Rather, the idea is to find a way that works for you and meets your needs.


*V. Tracking books

(Note: you can skip this section if you have no interest in maintaining a log of what you read.)

Whenever I finish reading any book, I make a note in my cell phone as a draft of a text message.  I include the name of the book and the date I finished (*).

*Almost anything that I need to do or want to remember which is not urgent for that day will end up as a draft of a text message.  About once a day (total of five days a week) I go through all the drafts while sitting at a computer and file into the appropriate place- events or commitments into my calendar, books I finished into the tracking document, ideas for blog posts into an email I send to myself, concepts to research directly into google, etc.

I do things this way because I find that it is very hard to be organized with your time if you do not wake up each morning knowing exactly what your obligations are and what you intend to do.  A habit of putting off any task by one day (but only one) when I can afford to allows me to organize my time and prevents me from reacting to little crises or interruptions that throw off my schedule.

I eventually transfer the name of the book, the author, and the date I finished reading into a google-doc.  If there are book notes, I do those separately and save them as a google-doc in my shared folder with the date I created the document and the title of the book as the file name.

I used to re-read two to four of the saved book note documents at work each week to try and find ideas to apply to my job.  Currently, I only go back and re-read book notes if I am thinking about a related idea but have no set schedule for reviewing my thoughts from past reading.

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Final thoughts?

No, not really.  There is not much to reflect on here because the above is just what I have fine-tuned over five years to get the most out of the time I spend reading.  I'll stress again- the best method will be different for everyone- hopefully, something in the above proves helpful in your efforts to establish a stronger reading process.

My apologies again for not posting the promised thoughts on running.  It will be up on Friday.

Probably.

Tim