8 Ways to Find More Time to Read.

If your To-Be-Read pile is getting away on you (and I’ve been hearing that a lot lately), then brace yourself…the holiday season is coming, when friends and relatives who know you’re a bookaholic are just going to add to your misery.

You need a plan for whittling away at the pile.  More time to read?

Here are eight strategies for finding hidden pockets of time to add to your available reading time, and knock down the height of that stack of books a little.

1.  Add Mobipocket reader to your smartphone or cellphone.

Mobipocket Reader software is free, works on almost any platform, and converts just about any electronic file format going.  Plus, you carry your cellphone with you wherever you go.  Put the two together.

Then add a copy of the latest book you’re reading.

Now, you can read whenever you have a moment, wherever you are.  No matter where you are.  This snatching of moments really adds up.  And don’t let the tiny screen on your phone phaze you.  You’ll get used to it very, very quickly (like, as soon as you get sucked into the story again).  The Japanese have been reading novels on their phones for a couple of years now, and it’s screamingly popular over there.

As soon as you find yourself standing in a line anywhere, or paused waiting for anything, whip out your phone.  Mobipocket reader holds the book open where you left off, so you don’t even have to page through to find out where you were.  Just start reading.  Shut the phone down when you have to get moving again.  Even if it’s just a couple of screen’s worth, every few minutes or so, the pages will add up.  I speak from experience.

Mobipocket Reader can be found here.

2.  Break the paperback up into chunks and stuff it into your pocket/bra.

This is the dead-tree version of (1).  It destroys the paperback, but it gets it read.  If you later find out you loved the book, you can buy a keeper hardcover version, or another paperback with an un-cracked spine.

3.  Read for ten minutes (more) at night before you sleep.

If you already read at night before you sleep, add an extra ten minutes for a while.  If you don’t read before you sleep (is there any bookaholic who doesn’t?), then read for ten minutes before you shut off the light.  You won’t notice ten minutes’ worth of sleep deprivation.

4. Read in the bathroom.

Well d’uh.  If you don’t already and this is a complete shock to you, take a deep breath.  Jayne over at Dear Author has just run a poll and discovered a whopping 66% of readers read in the little room.  Join the majority, if you haven’t already.

5.  If you drive, listen to your books, instead.

I used to think that audio books were only good for non-fiction, but All About Romance are pretty big on them.  They’ve just done a round up for November that you’ll find interesting, including ratings on the narrators themselves.  If you drive yourself to work, here’s a great way to consume your favourite author’s titles, and make the commute interesting, both.

6.  Read on the treadmill.

You can actually buy boards and devices designed to hold a paperback or hardcover, but you can jury rig your own with a stiff piece of board and a few rubber bands, designed to sit on the dash of a treadmill that has a lip to hold magazines in place.  Instead of flipping through months-old fitness magazines, read a chapter or two of your current book, while you’re sweating through twenty minutes of jogging or hard walking.  Although reading while you’re at an all-out sprint probably isn’t going to work, any other pace will allow you to read — especially if you’re reading an electronic device that will scale up the font, and can be thumbed through easily.

7.  Stop watching television

This one usually goes over like a lead balloon, because television is like crack to most people.  But if you gave up watching television, you would immediately free up hours of time per week you could instantly devote to reading books instead.  At least think about it.  There’s not much benefit to television watching, and if you’re watching it live, you’re twice an idiot…but that’s a whole different subject.

There are varying levels of compromise.  You could read your book during the commercial breaks, if you must watch television live…but try recording the shows and watching them later.  Read your books while the show is recording.

Better still, buy the season when it comes out on DVD, and by-pass all the nasty commercials and cut scenes, and get to watch the show on your terms.  Much more civilized.  And surprisingly time efficient.

8.  Stop sleeping in on the weekends.

Surprise!  After slogging your guts out all week, you probably figure you’re entitled to lounge around on Saturday morning, right?

Actually, what you’re doing is screwing with your body clock and making yourself feel miserable.  If you go to bed at a reasonable time on Friday night and pull yourself out of bed at the same time on Saturday and Sunday as you do the rest of the week, and get going — have a normal breakfast, get dressed, and get moving, you’ll feel much, much better.  Energized, refreshed and actually happy.  And you’ll get astounding amounts of things done, freeing up your time to do lovely stuff, like reading for the rest of the day, while everyone else is just getting themselves into gear.  And you are going to feel so much better on Monday morning, too, because your body doesn’t have to reset itself all over again.

 

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