How To Read

Once, a number of years ago, I was talking to the teenage daughter of a friend of my then boyfriend, and she asked me what I did for a living. I told her that I was a writer, and she said, encouragingly, “That’s great! Books are coming back! Like Polaroid!” I may have told this story before, because it’s one of my favourites, simultaneously making me laugh while my heart sinks into my boots.

I was reminded of it yet again by a Guardian article from last week citing a study that more than a third of UK adults have given up reading for pleasure, and half of all UK adults do not regularly read. Or at least, they do read, but only articles online, for information. They no longer read books. They are taking pictures, they just aren’t using their Polaroids anymore.

Of course, some of those people are quite happy not to read. I remember when I was 18 and worked in a pub, one of the other bar staff looked with bafflement at the book I was reading on my breaks (albeit a huge book - Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy) and asked me, with a mixture of confusion and fascination: “Why do you read?” I explained that it was like TV, but you make up the pictures in your head. I don’t think I convinced him.

Others though, including many of my friends, used to read with great pleasure but have told me that they find it harder and harder - too busy, too tired, too distracted, too used to the immediate rewards of the internet. If this describes you - a lapsed reader who misses their old habit - here is my advice; indeed my own method, because I was once one of you, and I have cured myself!

1. Choose your type of book. I read an article a while ago, not sure where, almost certainly the New Yorker because that’s usually where I find things, which talked about how the speed at which you read influences your enjoyment of what you read, and that this is subjective from person to person. Which is to say: no matter the content of the book, if it is written in a style that is too dense for you to read at the pace at which you are happiest, it will feel like hard work; and if it is written in a style that is too breezy and you zoom through it, you may find yourself easily distracted. But where the pace of the book matches your ideal reading speed, that’s when you have that feeling of being totally absorbed. That’s the feeling we are looking for here. So think back to the last time you were utterly submerged in a book. This might not be your “favourite” book - maybe you revere Middlemarch, but you know that those first 100 pages were a slog, but you once lost an entire weekend to a Marian Keyes - then head toward a smart beach read type of book. On the other hand, maybe even though you love a good Keyes, when you read them you find yourself checking your phone because there isn’t quite enough complexity to hold your attention. Then maybe you need some Eliot. This is not a comment on the quality of the writers. It is entirely subjective. You are looking for books which seem to be perfectly paced for YOU. Think also about genre: is there a type of book that is guaranteed to suck you in? Romance, sci-fi, crime, books about horses? I do not judge! Just identify it for yourself. Me? Pace somewhere between Eliot and Keyes, genre perhaps a family saga, maybe set sometime circa WW2, or a modern book about mismatched adult children coming together for a wedding / funeral / etc (Elizabeth Jane Howard’s Cazalet Chronicles, The Heirs by Susan Rieger which I have just started and has got me stuck into it like a fly on a spider’s web.)

2. Now go to a bricks-and-mortar bookshop or library if you possibly can. It is really hard to browse online. Amazon will suggest things to you but mostly from a narrow pool of publisher-promoted titles, and while you can download samples onto your Kindle, realistically you will only probably do that for a few books. In a bookshop you can wander the shelves and the tables, picking things up, reading a paragraph here and there, seeing the name of an author you loved but had forgotten on a spine. You can be inspired. You can also ask for advice - I love Marian Keyes, I have read them all, who next? You are looking for that feeling after reading a few sentences, like a fish that has just been pleasingly hooked and wants to be reeled in. Remember: you are looking for the right pace as much as for an appealing subject. I’d also say don’t assume that a short book will be better for getting back into reading than a long one. Short books are often economical in style, which means that you might not feel like you’ve totally dug yourself in. Long books can draw you into a delicious saga. But if you feel intimidated by the idea of starting a long book, go for medium, Goldilocks style. I’d also avoid short stories or essays (I have been assuming fiction here, but of course you might be someone who prefers reading non-fiction). This is because you will have to go back into ‘starter’ energy with each story / essay, which is not the same as that glorious feeling of diving back into a book that you are already enjoying.

3. If at all possible, read a real book. I read on my Kindle all the time (other e-readers are available, and Amazon are arseholes, but I am fighting too many wars on too many fronts to take on Amazon too) because I often read in bed while my partner is sleeping so I need the backlight to see. However, for a case of wanting to get back into reading, not only are the aesthetic pleasures of holding a real book greater (the weight in your hands, the smell of the paper), and the ability to flick back or skim forward easier if you are confused or bored, the very fact of seeing the book and its cover around your home is a prompt in itself to remind you that you could be reading right now. However, if it needs to be an e-reader so be it. Just don’t read on your tablet or your phone - nothing that will send you an alert while you are reading, or will tempt you to look something up, and drag you away from the book.

4. Choose your time and place. Where and when do you like to read? You may be thinking: ‘I have no time to read, and that is the problem!’ and this might be true, for example if you have a job and young children, but if you do have time to spend on watching trashy TV / Instagram / Twitter / fantasy online shopping, then you do have time to read, but your brain is in search of easy relaxation calories and keeps directing you towards the junk option. So, for example, if you know that there is half an hour after the kids have gone to bed when you always find yourself on TikTok, this might once upon a time have been when you used to read. Or when you go to bed, or when you first wake up, or during your commute, or on Saturday mornings, or in the bath… Also, don’t imagine that you have to be alone. My partner and I often read quietly together in the evenings, with a bit of “Marie reading music” on (has to be instrumental as lyrics totally distract me - my current favourite reading music is anything by the band North Americans.) When I was a kid, some weekends, the whole family would be sitting around together, each deep in our own books. So reading can be sociable! As for place, unless you are doing your reading on the tube, think cosy. Bed, a comfy sofa, anywhere you can really snuggle down. If you’re British, you are already ahead of me here and have added a cup of tea.

5. If you possibly can, switch off your phone. Obviously, there are people with dependent children or parents, or jobs that keep them on call, but otherwise, anything can wait. So phone off. And then set a timer. (My timer is on my phone, so I need to have it nearby, but if you have another way of setting a timer, put your phone in another room where you can’t even see it.) While your timer is running, you are reading AND ONLY READING. No phone. Even if you don’t know the meaning of a word and want to look it up, too bad. Get a dictionary. You can go pee, you can make another cup of tea, but basically, while the timer is on, you are reading and that is that. Think about how long you want to set your timer for. It will probably sound insane to you, but when I first did this I set my timer for two hours, because I wanted to be utterly sunk into my book, and I was simultaneously trying to extend my attention span and detoxify my brain from the constant urge to look at things online. And at first it was really hard to keep going for two hours, but it did everything I was hoping for after only a few sessions, because I was basically going cold turkey. But you might want to set your timer for less, and who can blame you. I would advise not going below half an hour, though, because you’re not going to reset any reading habits in ten minutes at a time, and it’s hard to get totally lost in a book that fast (though I did once nearly miss my stop at Kings Cross because I’d started - from page one - reading Wolf Hall at Highbury & Islington, one stop away, and that’s how absorbed I was.) Anyway, in that time, you will keep reading, you will not stop and look at any devices, you will notice yourself being bored and frustrated and your mind wandering and you will go back to your book. When the timer goes off, you can stop, or keep going, whatever you like.

6. And then do it again. Once a week at least. If it isn’t getting easier and more pleasurable for you after a few sessions, consider the possibilities: are you reading the wrong book (too fast? too slow? Just a bit shit?) Are you reading in the wrong place (sun in your eyes? can’t stretch out?) or at the wrong time (constant interruptions from family members?) Are you falling asleep? Guess what - that is NOT A PROBLEM. If you are falling asleep, you are tired but also relaxed, which is good. I’d consider the possibility that that might be a nice time to carry on reading, to help you rest. Do you just not like reading? That is also fine. Give up without guilt and spend your time enjoying something else. If it is getting easier and more pleasurable, however, consider either lengthening the timer (you can always read beyond it anyway) or jettisoning it altogether. In which case, congratulations: you are now someone who reads for pleasure again!

7. A word on audiobooks: I don’t know anything about audiobooks, I only ever listen to them when I am trying to fall asleep, which is to say, I am deliberately not properly listening. Maybe you can adapt these instructions for them, but I would say that the risk is that you start multitasking - “reading” while doing the dishes, etc - and that’s contributing to the fracturing of attention which I would guess has made it hard for you to read in the first place. If you are a regular reader, then sure, do whatever you like, but for people who need to reestablish a habit I think I would not go down this route - but I am open to disagreement on this one, and do feel free to disagree with me in the comments (yes, we have comments now!)

That is my method, successful on 100pc of test subjects (me) and I hope it works for you, not least because as an author I need your custom and do not want to go the way of Polaroid. If you have any other tips, suggestions of books that helped you get out of a not reading patch, good instrumental reading music etc, please do share. And happy reading!