What are you reading in 2025?

[Autumnal]

Color me curious how that goes. I’ve been thinking about staking out required reading time before picking up my phone for anything but medical business

 

[Retros_x]

I tried these 10 page rules before and I always failed, what helped me were two things:

a) I have completely dummified my phone because I realized it destroyed my attention span. I have blocked all social media DNS, deleted a lot of distracting apps and have no colorful symbols anymore on my starting screen. I basically only use it for direct communication (no social media), Photos, Navigation and looking something up on the browser (no social media and other scrollable attention seekers again).

b) I bought an e-reader that I could take anywhere. Everytime I would pull out my phone to distract myself I pull out my e-reader now and read a few pages.

Interestingly enough this also led to me read more printed books again, not just e-books. I don't stress myself about number of books to read and reading challenges - but I have already read over 50 books this year. Before I've done this I had read 2-5 books per year only.

Gaming is still a big time eater, whenever an exciting game releases I definitely read less. But that is fine for me, because not like my phone usage, I actually enjoy playing a good game like right now Silent Hill f.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Trying a thing this week - 10 pages in each my graphic novel, fiction, non-ficiton, and game books before picking up computer

The gamification of Kindle telling me how many days in a row and how many weeks in a row I've been reading consistently definitely gets me to read a bit every single day, which adds up to whole books soon enough.

 

[prabe]

What did it for me when I reestablished my reading habit a bit more than a year ago was posting about it. I have a couple of discords where I post my little paragraph notes after every book, and I copy-paste those onto a little blog as well. Even if the vast majority of the time there's no conversation about what I'm reading, posting it feels like an accountability check.

It helps that most evenings, I can get through a 300-400-page novel between dinner and bedtime, without pushing the latter unreasonably late. (Also, I'm something of a night owl, so my "unreasonably late" is plausibly not yours.)

 

[Umbran]

I am currently in the middle of J.S. Bailey's Dalton Kane and the Greens, which is okay.

It is mostly about slow reveals of character histories that mold their current behaviors, stringing out answers to questions like, "Why did the main character faint at the sight of a salad?"

Not a masterful example of the approach, but serviceable as a delay between Dungeon Crawler Carl books.

 

[gban007]

Currently slowly rereading IT. I think i forget how well Stephen King can write about just everyday human horror, even outside of the supernatural stuff. Carrie to me is really about the horrors of bullying, and IT is half Pennywise being a nasty piece of work, and half humans being nasty pieces of work.

 

[pukunui]

Jut started a quick reread of Dragons of Autumn Twilight, paying particular attention to the descriptions of the main characters. I’d never noticed before that Raistlin’s white hair isn’t mentioned until 100+ pages in!

 

[Autumnal]

BookTubers who do these things are coming up on the 2025 Read What You Own challenge, with on official start date of November 5th. I tanked on my solo attempt earlier this year, but oddly enough, my increased level of stress makes me keen to try again. I like reading and enjoy having something to contribute to the comments of video by folks I like. Gotta make a new spreadsheet to reflect the things I’m interested in tracking at the moment.

 

[Retros_x]

Even if the vast majority of the time there's no conversation about what I'm reading, posting it feels like an accountability check.

yes, posting and reflection also really helps. Thats why I enjoy this thread here too! I also track and post on storygraph but I am considering going away from that and having a analogue book journal only for reflection (and this thread here ofc).

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Reading Bradbury makes my heart ache, in ways nostalgic, sad, and the thrill of fear when you see movement out of the corner of your eye, and realize phew! it was just a leaf falling or a squirrel jumping - or was it?

All of those are in a good way; but also I'm not sure I'm in a head-place right now to read him. Even reading the words "October Country" is bringing up some feels from when I read it so many years ago. Fahrenheit 451, Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes, Dandelion Wine... most of us I'm sure could go on with adding to their favorites. Bradbury was one of the best.

Bradbury's writing has this strangely beautiful heartbreak. It at once captures what it's like to be a kid, aching to be an adult but also fearful of leaving childhood behind, and being an adult desperately recalling your lost childhood. All of it done with a simple description of an autumn wind blowing leaves across a small town.

Currently slowly rereading IT. I think i forget how well Stephen King can write about just everyday human horror, even outside of the supernatural stuff. Carrie to me is really about the horrors of bullying, and IT is half Pennywise being a nasty piece of work, and half humans being nasty pieces of work.

King has a misanthropic streak in his writing. It's this synergy between the everyday and supernatural terrors.