Top Ten Tuesday – I need to quit you

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature created by The Broke and the Bookish. Every week they come up with a topic and invite whoever wants to add their own list to their own blog.

Bookish habits… we all have them. Some are really good, such as immediately writing reviews after reading a book, or keeping up to date with your reading goals and challenges. We collect books and all the book paraphernalia that’s popping up left and right. Our habits make us happy.

Or do they…?

If you’re like me, there are some habits that you KNOW are detrimental or destructive to your reading but it’s just so hard to break them! <shakes fist in the air>

Here are my Top Ten Bookish Habits I need to (or have) quit:

Things I NEED to quit

Reading for the wrong reasons – Everyone has their reason for reading: entertainment, enlightenment, knowledge, expanding world views, etc. So often I feel like I need to read for reasons other than the reasons that are important to me. The only things that leads to is disappointment and discouragement.

Feeling inferior because I’ve never read To Kill a Mockingbird – Everyone claims this is one of their favorite books. I’ve never read it and whenever I say this I get horrified looks, like “OMG how are you even existing?!” I then feel awful and stupid and like I shouldn’t exist without having read the book. But you know what? I have zero desire to read the book. There. I said it.

Reading down – While I primarily read YA, I feel like I need to be a little pickier about it. Not necessarily judgmental, but developing confidence in saying “Okay, this book, while good, is very young and I will probably not get much enjoyment or meaning out of it.” There have been books that I’ve read that were good and well written, but they lacked a depth that I needed. While I do understand that YA is written for <gasp!> young adults, there are those books that have so much depth that they can easily cross lines.

Being narrow-minded – For so long I had this idea stuck in my head that I would only read YA because I was burnt out on adult books. While this started out as true, I think after a while it just became stubbornness. I’ve done a little better, expanding my reading choices, but I know there’s much more room for branching.

Being a reading hipster – This slightly plays off “being narrow-minded” but I’ve always been a hipster about reading certain books. Like, I don’t read books that are “it” books just because they are “it” books. I mean, yeah… there are exceptions, but lately I’m finding myself enjoying them less and less. I also have a hard time with books that are being made into movies and being seen reading them just because the movie is coming out. Again, there are exceptions to this, and thanks to my Kindle I can read books without people thinking “Oh, she’s only reading that because there’s a movie coming out.”

Random bookmarks – I think it was Beautiful Creatures that mentioned the mom, before she died, used random small objects as bookmarks in her books. Chewing gum wrappers, an old receipt, a piece of ribbon, etc. This is something I’ve always done and when I read that I thought “Oh, how charming am I?!” But really… it’s gross. Chewing gum wrappers are not bookmarks. Be an adult and buy a bookmark, Candice.

Things I HAVE quit

Checking out more than 1-2 books from the library – As a kid and then the couple years between college and grad school I would leave the library with no less than 8 books. And 9/10 times, I would read all 8 books before they were due back. It was a rare occasion when I’d have to return a book to the library unread. I’ve tried this in recent years and end up returning 7 of those 8 books, unread. So I instituted the “less books, more trips” rule for library visits.

Buying books – I know, I know… this seems pretty awkward to say, but I don’t buy books anymore. I mean, sure, the occasional one here and there, but I think the last book I bought was in NYC when I was at BEA. I bought P.S. I Still Love You at Jenny Han’s book party. For a while I was buying books alllll the time. Sure, they were great deals, but my shelves are full of books that I thought I had to have and sounded SO good and I’ve yet to read any of them. So I put myself on a book buying ban and haven’t looked back! My pocketbook thanks me too.

Reading a book, loving it, then forgetting it – While I haven’t done a challenge update in forever, I did join the re-read challenge this year and have enjoyed rereading so many favorites! I used to reread books all the time when I was younger, but since starting this blog I rarely, if ever, reread a book. This year I’ve managed to break this habit and have picked up old (and new) favorites in lieu of a new never read book.

The reading rat race – Does anyone else ever feel like in the blogging world reading is a rat race? We’re all trying to get the latest book, trying to read more than the next person, and find ways to out do not only ourselves but each other. Don’t get me wrong… I’m not saying it’s bad, because thanks to those who push themselves we’re giving a wide-array of information. But I just found myself feeling so overwhelmed with keeping up with the Joneses that I was missing out on enjoying what I got into blogging for in the first place: reading good books.

This one was a bit harder, but it’s nice to see what I have changed and to be self-aware of things I need to change!