52 books challenge

I, too, think that the 52 books a year goal is unrealistic and very easy to fail, especially when it comes to self-help books. You shouldn't really race through those like you can with fiction.

I don't have a numbered book challenge for 2016, but let's say that my book-related goal for next year is to cut the number of books I have on my Kindle, but which I haven't read. Right now, I have way too many books that I bought on impulse, just sitting there on the device, unread and sad.

 

Love this!
So far in 2016 I gotta finish how to win friends and influence people, the power of habit, prayer,how to kill a mocking bird, awaken the giant within and the alchemist

 

Question, is it bad to read different books at the same time or should you just read one at a time?

 

I could be up for this. I have a huge backlog of books I own that I haven't read yet but continually keep putting it off..

 

Personally, I am reading 1 self-help book (Male sexuality, Mantak Chia) and 1 fiction at the same time (1984, Orwell), depending on the mood. It works fine for me.
However, I am reading them in two different languages, maybe that helps switching too ... The first one in my native language (French) and the second one in English.

And indeed, it is good to have some goals, and reading many books is a very good one, because we concentrate on one thing at a time, compared to reading online which can be very dispersing ; but I think we shouldn't force ourselves to read this or that many books. If it becomes a burden, we can rapidly lose interest ... and we don't want this to happen.

 

I'm reading all of these as well!

 

I just ordered ~30 books on www.thriftbooks.com

Nearly every book costs $3.59 and seeing that it might have been compulsive to buy ~$150 of books, I can guarantee you I'm going to be reading more than I ever have in my life. It's a combination of high school classics that we should have paid attention to (The Great Gatsby, 1984, Catcher in the Rye, etc.), with some fiction books I've always wanted to read (Inheritance Series AKA Eragon, Sherlock Holmes Series, Robert Langdon Series, the three classics by Jules Verne, etc) as well as a plethora of self-improvement books (nearly everything by Dale Carnegie, The Slight Edge, "Take a nap! Change your life", Stumbling on Happiniess, etc.). I've been reading more for the last month or two, and I can't wait to read through all these books. Overambitious, I know - but it's just one book at a time!

 

In general, you are fine reading multiple. One of the arguments supporting this is our forgetting curve combined with the value of spaced repetition. Batch processing a single book into a tiny space of time leads to forgetting much the same way you forget after an exam cram session. Interleaving practice is also very good and often is easier to accomplish with multiple input methods/sources.

Be careful about interference and overwriting 'competing' brain spaces with new info before it has had time to consolidate. Taking good notes, not doing too much at one time, sleeping...those sorts of things can help alleviate that. Also picking varied topics can exercise the brain in different and complementary ways. I always enjoyed studying chess and programming at the same time for example. But math and programming?...not always complementary (ymmv).

It is also much like having multiple projects at work. You end up being more efficient in the long run because life and work projects both have stalls. Say you have a GTD list of 10-15 major projects. On any given Sunday, you will almost certainly make progress on one or several of them (triaged of course). However, if you just have one and the consultant that answers your questions is on vacation this week, then you are SOL? Similarly, if you are reading multiple books and get bored with one or stuck, no big deal. Hit the next one. But if you Highlander it and say there can be only one, you aren't moving anywhere fast and have a brick wall to contend with. You might even abandon the book and not even know why (really you just mis-ascribe why).

Personally, I am building a physical library in my apartment. Right now I probably have 30 books available to read and 80-90 on Kindle. Needless to say I definitely get my daily reading in. And the tomes? Handle the tomes in small chunks. A book is not a book is not a book. A tome might be equivalent to 5-6 other books, so 1+1 can = 7. See why I have trouble with math?