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Comment by wombatmobile | Hacker News Reader

Why do you read one book at a time?

Have you tried more than that and found it unsatisfactory?

I usually have two books on the go. I leave them in different places. That’s key. I am a different person in each place, and I can keep my associations separate and distinct for each book.

Given enough places, I’m confident I could read more than two books in parallel.

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I was a one-book-at-a-time person for the longest time, and in the last two years relaxed what I realized was an arbitrary rule and allowed myself to read any of a number of books (because I buy them faster than I can read them anyways) depending on my mood. I currently have at least one going in each of these areas:

- technical

- design

- autobiography

- classic fiction

- short nonfiction anthology

- history

Progress is a lot slower per book, but it’s not a race. I much prefer being able to pick up whatever I’m interested in at the time than having to wait, feeling like I have to slog through the end of the current book.

By the way, this is also a much better learning strategy. Switching topics means to recall the information before continuing, which is very much desirable.

One of the books I’m reading is Swann’s Way, which is basically stream-of-consciousness in structure, and there’s an appendix with a synopsis that references page numbers. I usually read the latest paragraph of that to bring me back up to speed before diving into the text. Super useful tool that I wish came with every book… I see things like Sparknotes in a whole new light now. But manual recall is definitely a good exercise!

I read promiscuously. I want the ideas from disparate topics to have sex and produce novel offspring in my mind.

That's such a good way of describing it!

I have a similar approach. I'll read a math textbook and a novel. Helps keep me motivated to read more rather than thinking "Ugh, I need to read that textbook now."

Yeah, I don't understand this. I actually read 5 to 10 books at a time. Many "classics" that we have these days were actually published as periodicals/in serial form. So when War and Peace was first published, no one sat down and just read 1500 pages. New chapters were released once a month or so over the period of 2+ years.

So if that's how War and Peace was originally read, why shouldn't I read it the same way?

It would be neat to be able to subscribe to a monthly email that sends a chapter at a time.

That would be a fun project to create for public domain works. And not especially difficult.

I'd guess reading ebooks, even on tablets or phones, makes one-book-reading the path of least resistance. I mostly read multiple because I physically keep the (paper) books near where I read them. I'll read a different book in bed than at my desk than in the living room, because that's what's there. Some of those (the bedside one, especially) don't tend to travel with me. Others might. It's mostly a result of the physicality and locality of the actual books, as objects.

However, if I'm reading a book on my phone & tablet, I'll mostly stick to one until I'm done with it. They way they sync reading status and time-of-last-access across devices encourages it, even with multiple devices.

I read almost exclusively on my ereader, so “two books in different places” does not apply to me. But years ago before the ereader existed I also self-disciplined to one book at a time.

If I don’t, my reading will become like my internet browsing: chasing my interest of the moment, half reading something about it, going on another chase and never properly engaging with one subject.

Of course some people will be better at context switching and the discipline to actually finish the multiple books they’re reading…but not me.

I have added your response to my collection of wisdom; particularly for the statement "I am a different person in each place."

I also do two, usually one fiction and one non-fiction.

Reading a fiction and a non-fiction is doable. Non-fiction and another non-fiction as well. But not two fiction novels at the same time.

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