Second-hand books: the more-beaten up the better. Has ideally had a few rounds in a tumble drier with a few handfuls of gravel. New books: the pristine condition must be maintained at all costs, no matter how much your hands hurt from awkwardly holding it so the spine doesn't get bent.
That's why I prefer to buy hardbacks when buying new books. They look better on my shelf, and you don't need to worry about the spine cracking whilst reading.
I swear to god this generation is educating themselves. How many ppl didn't really enjoy school, even took home some negative internal messages BUT happily lap up books and video essays to learn and take notes. The education system is wonky and we are filling the gaps ourselves. Thank god for RUclips.
Hey Hi Hello! Just dropping by bc I am very passionate about this and I need to share: I have studied Book Science (like, I literally have a degree on just... BOOKS) and we had several seminars and specific cases in which it's like a holy grail to find books with cracked spines, dogears, text in the margins, etc. From a scientific standpoint, it is actually BETTER to do those things bc future generations will be able to tell which stories were popular during our time, how they were read, what we were thinking about which stories, all that really cool stuff that I got to find out about people long dead merely through a few lines they had written in a well-loved book!
Yes! I work in a library’s archives/special collections, and when we have an extra copy of a book, we keep the one that tells us about the previous owner, and put the pristine one into general circulation
Good to hear that I’m doing science a service as everyone else hates how I abuse books 🥲 (and by abuse, I just mean write, dog ear, break spines, etc. Light water and coffee damage is a possibility as well)
@@BrightonDestiny so many of my books have the coffee mug circle on the cover and I like to think that one day a book scientist will analyse my caffeine intake solely based on that :D
I'm very passionate about 'how many book do you read at once' question. I usually have 2-4 books, and It's both practical, and mood-based. Practical, because one is audiobook, one is kindle/paperback, and one is sometilhing bigger I can't bother carrying around. Based on mood: one Non-fiction and/or classic, for when I have enough brain power. One huge Fantasy or SF or hardhitting contemporary, for when I want emotional investment. And one light, funny, easy read (often children or miidle grade), for when that's what I need. This way I can read regardless of where I am and how I feel :)
I always listed my hobby as reading growing up. I'm a library reader so the book online community is so interesting to me, because its primarily people who purchase books. I feel like there's a whole culture around it that I never participated it. I just spent all my childhood hours in the library reading whatever they had and borrowing like 50 books at a time.
I’m the same way! Sometimes I just want to tell them that they’re throwing away their money when their library probably has like 90% of the books they would want to read, but obviously it’s their money and they can do what they want with it...
Cool marginalia fact: Jane Austen bought a novel called Camilla by a fellow author, Frances Burney (who was a huge name when Austen was starting out!) the novel has this really annoying interfering character, Dr M, who keeps coming up with reasons the main couple shouldn't marry. Which is why it's 1,000+ pages long! Austen wrote an obituary to Dr M on the last page, killing him off 💀
Fun fact!! Medieval plays are mostly preserved in the marginalia or on the back of invoices and receipts! The earliest extant copy we have of a Robin Hood play is on the back of a rent invoice. They're also usually covered in doodles of dragons and dick picks. Real fun, we love the Middle Ages.
I was just saying to my husband I dog ear my books and I don't care, they're miiiiine I can do whatever I want. Then he told me he doesn't do that but he uses highlighters, which I thought was appalllling. 😂😂
I’ve only ever written (sort of) in a book once. In 3rd grade I was reading a library copy of Judy Blume’s Blubber, and came across the word ‘fuck’. I was so shocked that I took a sharpie and blotted it out and then immediately regretted it since a) it wasn’t my book and b) made it unreadable for the next person. I can’t tell you what Blubber is about because that episode just overshadows my memory of it completely. When I was in my twenties I worked in a new and used book store and my favourite ‘holiday’ to gussy the store up for was banned books week (this was back when I lived in the States). I always thought of what I did to Blubber and associated it with censorship (though it was not the same), and hell I still feel intense guilt over marking up a book that wasn’t mine.
Re bookmarks: i love going back to a book and being able to pinpoint a specific read of it due to a bookmark. I noticed it accidentally but then started doing it deliberately. So i’ll put a receipt (with a date) or something location-y or activity-y in as a bookmark. Hust something which will likely trigger a memory so i have a record of every time inread the book…
I love how you say „a class is supposed to be once a week or something“. Tell that to the netherlands. Four weeks for one class and the required reading is crazy. I started reading a book in september and still haven‘t finished because I‘ve been reading so many scientific articles and trying to cram the entire content into my head. Sorry for the super random comment, I just needed a tiny little venting
Yeah, I basically stopped reading for fun while I was at university in the Netherlands. I also studied English Literature, so I had to read SO MUCH for classes that it was basically impossible to read for fun. And yes, some of the books/texts were fun, but just as many were just an absolute struggle to get through in time before next class 😅
@@meikusje I don't even bother getting through them before the next class. Like, Week 4 is starting tomorrow and I'm currently summarizing Week 2 and that's totally fine with me as long as I get done before the exam
@@y.lime245 It is manageable, it just is a lot of work. I started working with flashcards which was absolutely amazing for my last exam so you might want to consider that, and in general, just start studying early and don't overthink everything too much
I like to cut out the photo of a strip of BACON off the package and use that as a bookmark. Perfect size, perfect shape and it makes me smile when I open my book. Reminds me of working at the Beaverton City Library where some old man kept returning books all smelly with grease stains in the gutter. Eventually the director called him to ask about it and he told her that he used RAW and/or cooked BACON as a bookmark and he could do so because “I pay my {expletive deleted} taxes”. She told him if he did it again he would be banned from the library. He did. He was. 📖 🥓 📕 🥓 📚
I also read a lot whenever I'm on the train. This year I've gotten into a small habit of finding the playlists of all the songs mentioned in the book I'm reading. Whenever I'm walking to and from the train I listen to the playlist. Once I'm on the train I switch to the instrumental version of the music or some classical music. This has helped me dive into the world of the book much more easily. This has changed the game when it comes to public transport reading, it's way harder to get distracted. I love love love it. My favourite so far has been the Norwegian Wood playlist.
i remember the early days of book tags when more people talked about their practices and some were SHUNNED! happy to realise i don’t care at all about any of them anymore and dog ear the books i own, listen to audiobooks all the time, and read multiple books at once. ~growth. also i can listen to music but usually it’s just to block out the noise of other people.
On breaking the spine... I have a friend with amazing taste in books and they will happily lend you books. But they will actually kill you if you break the spine of a book and I´m a spinebreaker so everytime I visit them and see all the books I can´t risk to borrow it´s painful!
I find when I'm getting quite anxious about what's happening in a scene, that skipping to the next one and easing into the fact that the world didn't end before going back to the scene I couldn't do really helps me not abandon books!! I can't watch films or television for this very same reason, never have been able to 😂😂
bookmarks: i don't have "proper" bookmarks, i.e. stuff specifically meant to be bookmarks. but i have gotten a lot of enamel pins from independent artists over the year and most of them (if not all) come attached to little art cards as a backing, usually with a similar theme as the pin. and my gosh they make the best bookmarks! they're pretty, i have many different styles so i can match the style with the vibe of the book, and i can repurpose the little cards which otherwise would be stored in a box forever or thrown away. reading out loud: generally i don't. BUT if the book is really hitting home, or a conversation/paragraph is really funny or poignant i will read certain parts out loud to pause and really allow myself to take it in/enjoy the comedy. also, multitasking: TV is a big no, but music often helps add to the mood of the story i'm reading, or helps drone out the noise from other people and therefore helps me focus better.
Am living for your vlogmas videos Leena. Ha, I have loads of bookmarks but it tends to be tickets or receipts too. I love silence with books too. I struggle on bloody trains because of this.
#6 really got me. i've always been someone reading multiple books at once. currently, though i'm in the midst of my masters thesis and i am in the middle of over 30+ books, many of which will probably never be fully finished reading because I've received from them the information i need right now. almost all of these are non-fiction, or poetry which makes this easier to read this quantity at this time, but its sometimes reading a page to 30 of 5+ different books in a day
Oh my god! Thank you so much for doing no-misery- mas! I’m in school and have so many deadlines right now but I know I can look forward to your videos EVERY DAY!!! Love you💕💕❤️
Oh! Probably the number one biggest difference between my husband and I (both big readers) is his books look like they just came fresh from the publisher and mine all look extremely well loved. I DEVOUR books. I crack spines with abandon, dogear pages, underline, write notes (in fact in several novels with complicated family structures I have drawn the family trees in the fly leaves), the whole nine. It. Drives. Him. Crazy. And while I am not the voracious reader I once was, I made it my goal to read 24 books this year (I know, you read that in a slow weekend, but I have 2 kids) and I made my target over a month ago! A million years ago in graduate school I remember mentioning what I was reading to a classmate and they were astounded that I read for pleasure, given all of the other reading we had to do. And I told them that I *had* to. It was my palate cleanser and how I took a break from all of the heavy reading for school. This year I increased my reading by setting aside the books I had that I knew I *ought* to read, and allowed myself to focus on just the books that I *wanted* to read, and I think that made all the difference of getting me back in the habit. Also, yes, at least 6 books going at any one time, including some long dormant on my old Nook that I have since replaced with a kindle but can't get rid of until I finish reading the books on it!
On the note of multiple books - it recently took me 14 months to finish a book. It is a great book, but it is also very sad, so I'd read a chapter or two in a sitting, and with the past couple years I haven't always been up for sad reading so sometimes it would sit for months before picking it up again, but I could always pick it up again and enjoy the world and remember what had happened. Book is "Mornings in Jenin" by Susan Abulhawa, very sad, very good, but read the trigger warnings on story graph as it does deal with some heavier topics that not everyone may be comfortable with
I do a lot of reading while my family is watching tv - with six of us all having different tastes, we all tend to have a book on hand for when we aren't interested in what the family is watching. I actually love how cosy it is curling up on the sofa with my family and reading
Break the spine every time! I underline and dog ear pages I love. My partner does this too and it’s really fun to see what they liked when I read their books.
I’m absolutely with you with getting distracted by sounds when reading I often get so frustrated by constant noises stopping me from getting into the book and the London commute is made for reading but I use audiobooks as I get horrendously travel sick on every form of transport and writing in books is still a habit I have from my uni English lit days. Really loved this video and now I want to go and spend my Sunday reading…
1. Do you have a certain place at home for reading? Not really. I read in my bed, not necessarily when I'm about to go to sleep, I just find being prone very comfortable. I also read on the toilet and in the bath because I feel like I'm wasting time if I do those things without also doing something else and I can't listen to things during those times. 2. Bookmark or random piece of paper? I have a bookmark I have been using since high school that I got from the school library when I volunteered there. It's very tattered at this point and falling apart but I would be/will be sad if/when I have to throw it away. Before that, I would just use a piece of paper from a notepad, and before that, when I was a child, I only read for school so I just wrote down the page I was last on in my school journal. 3. Can you just stop reading or do you have to stop after a chapter/ a certain amount of pages? I don't have to reach the end of a chapter, although I prefer to if I'm close to one. Otherwise I will just find the end of a paragraph that is a clear stopping space so it's obvious when I come back to it. 4. Do you eat or drink while reading? Drink sure, but I cannot eat since I need both hands to hold the book open. 5. Multitasking: Music or TV while reading? Nope, same as you where all sounds are distracting. In day to day activities, I can tune out voices, but when reading, people will take priority in my head over what I am reading unfortunately. 6. One book at a time or several at once? I have only once read multiple books at once and even then it was only 2 at a time. I much prefer to read one at a time, it just is easier to follow the stories that way. 7. Reading at home or everywhere? Mostly read at home. I like to keep my books pristine so I only take books out the house when I know I can keep them from being damaged in transportation. When I was a child I would read in the car but now I feel sick as well. 8. Reading out lout or silently in your head? If I vocalise, I cannot absorb the information I am reading. I always found when reading aloud in English lessons I'd have to reread those passages again later because I could not recall any of it. 9. Do you read ahead or even skip pages? No, ocassionally I will flip through just to get a sense of the book but I try not to spoil for myself, even if I know the general plot or can guess where it's going. 10. Breaking the spine or keeping it like new? I prefer not to but if it happens through use, I have no issue with it. 11. Do you write in your books? No never. I wrote my name in my books as a kid but I hate seeing writing in books now.
I hate the underlining thing, especially in a library book. I find that it puts the reader's emphasis on it rather than the author's and that puts me off. Though i did find a book my friend gave me that had a whole load of words underlined and written in Italian, it was so sweet that someone was clearly learning English with it and double cute when i thought it was my friend (though just a coincidence as he got the book for free himself)
I work in a library so most of the time I read 5 books at the same time. I can never decide which one to read first. I prefer non fiction at the moment. I read a lot about health, psychology and climate change. Reading helps me to accept my life the way it is and going to book shops gives me the feeling of hope. There is just so much knowledge and connection to be found in books (: I really struggle with finding time to read. I did not use social media für 5 years and now I scroll through instagram again, which is not helping me to focus on my reading xD
I’ve been listening to audiobooks more often recently and I’ve been listening to them in large chunks while I work on painting. It really gets me in the zone for painting and also immerses me in the book.
I kinda love those random things used as bookmarks. I like cutting up the Clipper-teaboxes (they've got such pretty pictures) and use them as bookmarks, which make the book smell a bit tea-y (which I think is really nice). I get a lot of books from the library and every time I'm a little sad I can't write in the margins of those books...
This was just such a cosy feel good just what I needed kind of video. Thank you Leena!!! Also: mostly just one book at a time, love bookmarks that mean something to me (my sister made me a lovely one), and can and will read anywhere and everywhere
Bookmarks... I have two of the same kind (one is always lost in a book I started and forgot about/decided to "come back to") that I switch between all my books I read, they have this elastic on them that wraps around the book and holds it closed when you're not using it, I've had them for ages, love them. And then there's the new books I start on the way home from somewhere and they just live with whatever receipt or scrap paper I found in my bag at the time
I also love reading a book more than once and underlining in a different color. Sometimes I understand something in a different way, or I'm drawn to another passage - I agree its very interesting!
I like paperbacks that fit in my pockets. I’m befuddled by the bookstores supplying the large paperbacks when a book is first released and maybe the smaller one later on, silliness! Does anyone prefer the large? The font isn’t any bigger so…
Struggle really hard to DNF a book, if I can't read it physically I moved to an audiobook, if I'm still bored I listen to it at 2x speed and if I'm still super bored then I go read a summary and get it over with. But I'm just as likely as leaving it on my reading list for years until I get to it.
Leena!!!! I remember a few years ago you had a video about YA books/authors “doing it right” and it just popped into my head today! I looked for the video but it looks like it’s either been taken down or made private, I would LOVE an updated version of that video! Maybe as part of miserymas??? 🤗
I could never understand my friends at University who needed the TV, radio, or any music playing when they were studying ... I always needed silence to be able to absorb what I was revising. It's the same with reading for pleasure ... I need complete silence to immerse myself in the characters and world I am reading about. I prefer to read when I am alone at home, but do enjoy reading on a long train journey.
I love your videos, and how they always make me think and reflect! Have you read The Heroine’s Journey by Gail Carriger? It’s a non-fiction analysis of storytelling themes and why we connect with them the way we do.
Post-its are the best bookmarks, you can place them exactly where you stopped reading , and they won't fall out of the book when you are carrying the books around. Also I like to write something stupid on them.
Kid me was OBSESSED with buying books from charity shops, and my most beloved books were often deliberately water damaged after I’d read them a few times - I read a LOT of handmedown, 5th hand books, and I really enjoyed the textures of “loved” books vs “pristine” books - I still prefer a water damaged book texture to this day, but I stopped deliberately dousing my books around age 12, mostly because I got a kindle, started reading fanfic, and began reading much longer series - going from 2-4 books in a series to 12 books per series within a year made me realize that water damaged books take up too much space to be conductive to Max Book Storage 😅 I also never doused a brand new book until it hit the 2-5yr mark, or I knew I would be the only owner - as the youngest in the family, I had a large gap between me and the next kid in the family (a full decade - cousins) I didn’t end up passing many of my books down.
"fun fact" even though tags are not done often in the HUGE parts of booktube they are still done in many spaces of booktube. I think you would like the "are you like jane austen" tag. I just started a non fiction about women and men and language, really good but in norwegian. I ALWAYS have 6-12 books reading atm.
Bookmarks are either gifts or freebies I get when buying books, but I go for receipts, a thread from sewing or a leftover yarn from crocheting, and I feel less bad if I lose those I have to stop at a page that ends with a sentence? Else I have to re-read so much to find where I stopped. I can't listen to music because that distracts me so much - I can watch RUclips and play a game and listen to music all at the same time but I need the quiet for reading. Reading on public transport and in cars makes me sick and dizzy :( I hate to abandon books after a few chapters but I just put them down and continue if I feel like it. On the other hand, I read different books and essays all the time for uni, aside from my freetime reading list. Unfortunately audiobooks take me so long because I have some audio processing issues, especially in English, and I really have to focus on them and can't do anything except listening to them which kinda defeats the purpose imo. I skip pages if it's really foreseeable? So if I know what's gonna happen and I don't wanna deal with it I skip. Forrest Gump for example, never watched the movie but the books was so foreseeable at times.... Break the spines, bend those as much as possible so I can hold them in one hand I love buying second hand since it's really inexpensive, I get many books for like 2-3 Euros, which is dirtcheap, but I don't like annotations and underlines when I first read a book because I want to form my own opinions and get a relation to the text and other people's annotations keep me from doing that
To be honest, the only way I read these days is via audio books. I've noticed that I have to be doing something while listening to audio books (or watching youtube for that matter). If I don't have two things going on at once I get this antsy drive in my stomach that I can't stand. So if I were reading a physical book, I would most definitely also need music playing to help keep the antsy energy at bay. I should probably get checked out for ADHD but I don't have that kind of money right now.
Hahaha I wish it was more socially acceptable 😂 I used to love reading out loud in class, I put voices on and completely embarrassed myself but had a great time
i normaly dont, but the last book i read ,the invisible life of addie larue, is super long slow fantasy stuff and i liked it but it was just so slow, that i started to read parts out loud to myself to appreciate the beautiful use of language more and also motivate myself to get through the story lacking parts, do yeah i do that but Im new to the business (;
Reading in a car or bus makes me feel sick and always has, and my bff has never forgiven me for telling her that. When she was a kid, she could read in the car with no bother and as soon as I told her it makes me sick, it started to make HER sick and she hates me for that 😅
I read poetry out loud almost always or mouth the words under my breath, but that's the only time for me. Also a big fan of reading multiple books at once.. but now I get to that point of the year where I'm only half way through my reading goal and I have like 5 books that i'm ~halfway through lol
I absolutely always have at least three books on the go: a fiction on my e-reader, something on audio, and a non-fiction in physical form. Because they're different media I have no problem switching between them, because my brain has been trained in what to expect in what format. Next year I'm going to try to start reading hard copy fiction again!
only tangentially related to this tag but i LOVE stickers and always buy cute ones when i see them and eventually i ran out of space on like my laptop and journals/sketchbooks so now i cover all my hardcover books in stickers under the dust jackets 😳🥴
I always HATED reading out loud but the last couple of books ive read ive read bits out loud to my boyfriend and its been really nice. Its not the same - i can’t do accents as well out loud as in my head but it was just nice to be able to share something that means so much without either ranting at him or forcing him to do something he doesn’t like (its not a big reader but likes the stores).
I used to very much be a one book at a time sort of person, it's weird but it never even crossed my mind that reading multiple books at once was an option. It's only thanks to booksta/booktube that I now read multiple. I usually try to have one fiction, one non-fiction and one audiobook on the go at once.
I tend have two or three books on the go at any one time, my partner has many more, we have a glass jar (was a pickle jar in previous life) in our living room full of bookmarks for when they are inevitably needed. CANNOT have TV/music on at the same time as reading
As an avid reader, your book related content is always a pleasure to see (although I do enjoy all your other content too!). After your book surgery, I wanted to ask for some recommendations on a couple of books related subjects. I generally read for pleasure, but next year want to work on getting more non-fiction in and learning more about the world around me, ideally one NF per month. What books would you recommend that start off easy to get me into the practice, and cover a broad range of subjects? Also, I'm currently a year into running a book club and want to improve on our discussions. One of the other parts of reading I struggle with is, is picking out themes and motifs that make for a good discussion from our chosen books. Do you have any recommendations for material that would help me to think more critically about what I'm reading? Or give me help with choosing books that could easily give more discussion points? Would love any help on the above!
Leena - can you please do a video on learning how to read faster? I'm a life long book lover but it takes me forever to get through print books, which are often more accessible than audiobooks. Thanks!!
The only spines I try hard not to break are library book spines (if they're not already broken) as those books are the work horses of the reading world and the best i can do to postpone their shelf life I will
Sounds are weird...washing machine is too loud in my apt; what gets me is when it's pretty quiet BUT there's some odd beeping noise from outside that disappears when I open the window and try to pinpoint it GAHHHH
1. I usually read in bed but it isn't the most ideal space. Mainly because the lighting is bad. 2. BOOKMARKS!!!! I collect them and most of them are homemade, usually from scrap pieces of craft paper. I also like it when the bookmark matches the aesthetic or genre of the book. 3. I can stop anywhere but ending at a chapter is very satisfying and convenient when I pick it back up. 4. I try to avoid eating or drinking while reading. The other day I had hot chocolate and spilled it all over a library book... 5. CANNOT. NO DISTRACTIONS OR ELSE MY BRAINCELLS SUFFER. 6. I prefer one at a time but I've been getting overwhelmed with my long TBR so I've been doing a few at a time. 7. Everywhere but mostly at home. I can read in the car :) 8. Silent in my head. 9. I don't skip ahead. 10. Break the spine I think? 11. Nope! But I'm going to annotate a book for the first time soon. Will be a second hand book.
Hey Leena! Loving the vlogmas so far!! Just so's you know the link to the series playlist says it doesn't exist... and I don't want to miss any when I'm cathcing up on videos : D
if you have a ridiculous number of bookmarks what i do is put one in each book as i buy it so all my unread books have bookmarks in the front and all the read ones have bookmarks in the back :) (i also love perfume tester slips as bookmarks, they're the right shape, they smell nice, they're gucci)
Second-hand books: the more-beaten up the better. Has ideally had a few rounds in a tumble drier with a few handfuls of gravel.
New books: the pristine condition must be maintained at all costs, no matter how much your hands hurt from awkwardly holding it so the spine doesn't get bent.
Completely agree!!
💯
That's why I prefer to buy hardbacks when buying new books. They look better on my shelf, and you don't need to worry about the spine cracking whilst reading.
Haha - totally agree - was just going to post the same kinda comment!!
I swear to god this generation is educating themselves. How many ppl didn't really enjoy school, even took home some negative internal messages BUT happily lap up books and video essays to learn and take notes. The education system is wonky and we are filling the gaps ourselves. Thank god for RUclips.
Hey Hi Hello! Just dropping by bc I am very passionate about this and I need to share: I have studied Book Science (like, I literally have a degree on just... BOOKS) and we had several seminars and specific cases in which it's like a holy grail to find books with cracked spines, dogears, text in the margins, etc. From a scientific standpoint, it is actually BETTER to do those things bc future generations will be able to tell which stories were popular during our time, how they were read, what we were thinking about which stories, all that really cool stuff that I got to find out about people long dead merely through a few lines they had written in a well-loved book!
Yes! I work in a library’s archives/special collections, and when we have an extra copy of a book, we keep the one that tells us about the previous owner, and put the pristine one into general circulation
Good to hear that I’m doing science a service as everyone else hates how I abuse books 🥲 (and by abuse, I just mean write, dog ear, break spines, etc. Light water and coffee damage is a possibility as well)
@@emilybrown148 aww I love that! books have so much history, it's lovely to think their stories get told and shown
@@BrightonDestiny so many of my books have the coffee mug circle on the cover and I like to think that one day a book scientist will analyse my caffeine intake solely based on that :D
Oh my god, you can study book science? I've done everything wrong
The skeleton intro alone brings me more joy with each episode
SO excited for this!! Honestly, when that intro music comes on and those skeletons start to boogie, it fills me with genuine Christmas cheer 😂
Agreed Anna!! Making look forward to something every day
Same 🕺 💀
Also the music Leena uses is always on point/awesome.
Totally identify with the "can read on public transportation but needs silence everywhere else" vibe 😂
I'm very passionate about 'how many book do you read at once' question. I usually have 2-4 books, and It's both practical, and mood-based. Practical, because one is audiobook, one is kindle/paperback, and one is sometilhing bigger I can't bother carrying around. Based on mood: one Non-fiction and/or classic, for when I have enough brain power. One huge Fantasy or SF or hardhitting contemporary, for when I want emotional investment. And one light, funny, easy read (often children or miidle grade), for when that's what I need.
This way I can read regardless of where I am and how I feel :)
I love your approach!
I often have one or two mangas or comics in my rotation, or children's books/ things I don't want people to see me with in public.
I’m exactly the same! It makes it so much easier to read a lot and enjoy all of it
I always listed my hobby as reading growing up. I'm a library reader so the book online community is so interesting to me, because its primarily people who purchase books. I feel like there's a whole culture around it that I never participated it. I just spent all my childhood hours in the library reading whatever they had and borrowing like 50 books at a time.
I’m the same way! Sometimes I just want to tell them that they’re throwing away their money when their library probably has like 90% of the books they would want to read, but obviously it’s their money and they can do what they want with it...
Cool marginalia fact: Jane Austen bought a novel called Camilla by a fellow author, Frances Burney (who was a huge name when Austen was starting out!) the novel has this really annoying interfering character, Dr M, who keeps coming up with reasons the main couple shouldn't marry. Which is why it's 1,000+ pages long! Austen wrote an obituary to Dr M on the last page, killing him off 💀
Your reading content is top tier soothing
oh how i envy the power of being able to read in a moving car. SO MUCH READING I COULD HAVE DONE
Fun fact!! Medieval plays are mostly preserved in the marginalia or on the back of invoices and receipts! The earliest extant copy we have of a Robin Hood play is on the back of a rent invoice. They're also usually covered in doodles of dragons and dick picks. Real fun, we love the Middle Ages.
What???? This is so cool!
I was just saying to my husband I dog ear my books and I don't care, they're miiiiine I can do whatever I want. Then he told me he doesn't do that but he uses highlighters, which I thought was appalllling. 😂😂
I’ve only ever written (sort of) in a book once. In 3rd grade I was reading a library copy of Judy Blume’s Blubber, and came across the word ‘fuck’. I was so shocked that I took a sharpie and blotted it out and then immediately regretted it since a) it wasn’t my book and b) made it unreadable for the next person. I can’t tell you what Blubber is about because that episode just overshadows my memory of it completely.
When I was in my twenties I worked in a new and used book store and my favourite ‘holiday’ to gussy the store up for was banned books week (this was back when I lived in the States). I always thought of what I did to Blubber and associated it with censorship (though it was not the same), and hell I still feel intense guilt over marking up a book that wasn’t mine.
I live in Mexico and waking up to these every day has been a blessing to my mornings.
“Yeah fight me basically” 😂 I break the spines too. It makes the book more comfortable to hold.
Re bookmarks: i love going back to a book and being able to pinpoint a specific read of it due to a bookmark. I noticed it accidentally but then started doing it deliberately. So i’ll put a receipt (with a date) or something location-y or activity-y in as a bookmark. Hust something which will likely trigger a memory so i have a record of every time inread the book…
I love how you say „a class is supposed to be once a week or something“. Tell that to the netherlands. Four weeks for one class and the required reading is crazy. I started reading a book in september and still haven‘t finished because I‘ve been reading so many scientific articles and trying to cram the entire content into my head. Sorry for the super random comment, I just needed a tiny little venting
Yeah, I basically stopped reading for fun while I was at university in the Netherlands. I also studied English Literature, so I had to read SO MUCH for classes that it was basically impossible to read for fun. And yes, some of the books/texts were fun, but just as many were just an absolute struggle to get through in time before next class 😅
@@meikusje I don't even bother getting through them before the next class. Like, Week 4 is starting tomorrow and I'm currently summarizing Week 2 and that's totally fine with me as long as I get done before the exam
I'm going on exchange to the Netherlands in January and I'm so worried about this 😓
@@y.lime245 It is manageable, it just is a lot of work. I started working with flashcards which was absolutely amazing for my last exam so you might want to consider that, and in general, just start studying early and don't overthink everything too much
@@mackenziesapphire7554 Okay! Thanks for the advice!!
My mom used to cut up old holiday cards for bookmarks.
I like to cut out the photo of a strip of BACON off the package and use that as a bookmark. Perfect size, perfect shape and it makes me smile when I open my book. Reminds me of working at the Beaverton City Library where some old man kept returning books all smelly with grease stains in the gutter. Eventually the director called him to ask about it and he told her that he used RAW and/or cooked BACON as a bookmark and he could do so because “I pay my {expletive deleted} taxes”. She told him if he did it again he would be banned from the library. He did. He was. 📖 🥓 📕 🥓 📚
@@intentionallyleftblank3016 oh dear god... but why... 🤯🤢
I also can't read in cars! It's extremely unfair
I also read a lot whenever I'm on the train. This year I've gotten into a small habit of finding the playlists of all the songs mentioned in the book I'm reading. Whenever I'm walking to and from the train I listen to the playlist. Once I'm on the train I switch to the instrumental version of the music or some classical music. This has helped me dive into the world of the book much more easily. This has changed the game when it comes to public transport reading, it's way harder to get distracted. I love love love it. My favourite so far has been the Norwegian Wood playlist.
Love your make up! I too love when people write in the margins. It feels like a really intimate look into their thought process. Love it!
i remember the early days of book tags when more people talked about their practices and some were SHUNNED! happy to realise i don’t care at all about any of them anymore and dog ear the books i own, listen to audiobooks all the time, and read multiple books at once. ~growth. also i can listen to music but usually it’s just to block out the noise of other people.
On breaking the spine... I have a friend with amazing taste in books and they will happily lend you books. But they will actually kill you if you break the spine of a book and I´m a spinebreaker so everytime I visit them and see all the books I can´t risk to borrow it´s painful!
I find when I'm getting quite anxious about what's happening in a scene, that skipping to the next one and easing into the fact that the world didn't end before going back to the scene I couldn't do really helps me not abandon books!! I can't watch films or television for this very same reason, never have been able to 😂😂
watching this while shredding a book that was falling apart i rescued from a trash stack and turning it into paper crafts feels weirdly resonant
bookmarks: i don't have "proper" bookmarks, i.e. stuff specifically meant to be bookmarks. but i have gotten a lot of enamel pins from independent artists over the year and most of them (if not all) come attached to little art cards as a backing, usually with a similar theme as the pin. and my gosh they make the best bookmarks! they're pretty, i have many different styles so i can match the style with the vibe of the book, and i can repurpose the little cards which otherwise would be stored in a box forever or thrown away.
reading out loud: generally i don't. BUT if the book is really hitting home, or a conversation/paragraph is really funny or poignant i will read certain parts out loud to pause and really allow myself to take it in/enjoy the comedy.
also, multitasking: TV is a big no, but music often helps add to the mood of the story i'm reading, or helps drone out the noise from other people and therefore helps me focus better.
I love your long answers! I find your opinions so interesting and tbh am happy to listen to you talk about literally anything 😊
Am living for your vlogmas videos Leena. Ha, I have loads of bookmarks but it tends to be tickets or receipts too. I love silence with books too. I struggle on bloody trains because of this.
#6 really got me. i've always been someone reading multiple books at once.
currently, though i'm in the midst of my masters thesis and i am in the middle of over 30+ books, many of which will probably never be fully finished reading because I've received from them the information i need right now.
almost all of these are non-fiction, or poetry which makes this easier to read this quantity at this time, but its sometimes reading a page to 30 of 5+ different books in a day
Oh my god! Thank you so much for doing no-misery- mas! I’m in school and have so many deadlines right now but I know I can look forward to your videos EVERY DAY!!! Love you💕💕❤️
Oh! Probably the number one biggest difference between my husband and I (both big readers) is his books look like they just came fresh from the publisher and mine all look extremely well loved. I DEVOUR books. I crack spines with abandon, dogear pages, underline, write notes (in fact in several novels with complicated family structures I have drawn the family trees in the fly leaves), the whole nine. It. Drives. Him. Crazy. And while I am not the voracious reader I once was, I made it my goal to read 24 books this year (I know, you read that in a slow weekend, but I have 2 kids) and I made my target over a month ago! A million years ago in graduate school I remember mentioning what I was reading to a classmate and they were astounded that I read for pleasure, given all of the other reading we had to do. And I told them that I *had* to. It was my palate cleanser and how I took a break from all of the heavy reading for school. This year I increased my reading by setting aside the books I had that I knew I *ought* to read, and allowed myself to focus on just the books that I *wanted* to read, and I think that made all the difference of getting me back in the habit. Also, yes, at least 6 books going at any one time, including some long dormant on my old Nook that I have since replaced with a kindle but can't get rid of until I finish reading the books on it!
I read aloud when I don't understand something, which makes sense because I have dyslexia
On the note of multiple books - it recently took me 14 months to finish a book. It is a great book, but it is also very sad, so I'd read a chapter or two in a sitting, and with the past couple years I haven't always been up for sad reading so sometimes it would sit for months before picking it up again, but I could always pick it up again and enjoy the world and remember what had happened. Book is "Mornings in Jenin" by Susan Abulhawa, very sad, very good, but read the trigger warnings on story graph as it does deal with some heavier topics that not everyone may be comfortable with
leena i swear lavender looks sooo good on u. first the iconic fluffy cardigan in the bridget jones video, next this eyeshadow. so pretty!!
I do a lot of reading while my family is watching tv - with six of us all having different tastes, we all tend to have a book on hand for when we aren't interested in what the family is watching. I actually love how cosy it is curling up on the sofa with my family and reading
Break the spine every time! I underline and dog ear pages I love. My partner does this too and it’s really fun to see what they liked when I read their books.
I’m absolutely with you with getting distracted by sounds when reading I often get so frustrated by constant noises stopping me from getting into the book and the London commute is made for reading but I use audiobooks as I get horrendously travel sick on every form of transport and writing in books is still a habit I have from my uni English lit days.
Really loved this video and now I want to go and spend my Sunday reading…
I get really carsick, too =( always jealous of my partner being able to read in the car lol
1. Do you have a certain place at home for reading?
Not really. I read in my bed, not necessarily when I'm about to go to sleep, I just find being prone very comfortable. I also read on the toilet and in the bath because I feel like I'm wasting time if I do those things without also doing something else and I can't listen to things during those times.
2. Bookmark or random piece of paper?
I have a bookmark I have been using since high school that I got from the school library when I volunteered there. It's very tattered at this point and falling apart but I would be/will be sad if/when I have to throw it away. Before that, I would just use a piece of paper from a notepad, and before that, when I was a child, I only read for school so I just wrote down the page I was last on in my school journal.
3. Can you just stop reading or do you have to stop after a chapter/ a certain amount of pages?
I don't have to reach the end of a chapter, although I prefer to if I'm close to one. Otherwise I will just find the end of a paragraph that is a clear stopping space so it's obvious when I come back to it.
4. Do you eat or drink while reading?
Drink sure, but I cannot eat since I need both hands to hold the book open.
5. Multitasking: Music or TV while reading?
Nope, same as you where all sounds are distracting. In day to day activities, I can tune out voices, but when reading, people will take priority in my head over what I am reading unfortunately.
6. One book at a time or several at once?
I have only once read multiple books at once and even then it was only 2 at a time. I much prefer to read one at a time, it just is easier to follow the stories that way.
7. Reading at home or everywhere?
Mostly read at home. I like to keep my books pristine so I only take books out the house when I know I can keep them from being damaged in transportation. When I was a child I would read in the car but now I feel sick as well.
8. Reading out lout or silently in your head?
If I vocalise, I cannot absorb the information I am reading. I always found when reading aloud in English lessons I'd have to reread those passages again later because I could not recall any of it.
9. Do you read ahead or even skip pages?
No, ocassionally I will flip through just to get a sense of the book but I try not to spoil for myself, even if I know the general plot or can guess where it's going.
10. Breaking the spine or keeping it like new?
I prefer not to but if it happens through use, I have no issue with it.
11. Do you write in your books?
No never. I wrote my name in my books as a kid but I hate seeing writing in books now.
I'm 100% team Sanne when it comes to not breaking the spine but I respect you as a reader.
I've been lowkey entering a hypomanic episode and I can't find anything that will calm my racing thoughts except your videos
I hate the underlining thing, especially in a library book. I find that it puts the reader's emphasis on it rather than the author's and that puts me off. Though i did find a book my friend gave me that had a whole load of words underlined and written in Italian, it was so sweet that someone was clearly learning English with it and double cute when i thought it was my friend (though just a coincidence as he got the book for free himself)
I work in a library so most of the time I read 5 books at the same time.
I can never decide which one to read first. I prefer non fiction at the moment.
I read a lot about health, psychology and climate change.
Reading helps me to accept my life the way it is and going to book shops gives me the feeling of hope. There is just so much knowledge and connection to be found in books (:
I really struggle with finding time to read.
I did not use social media für 5 years and now I scroll through instagram again, which is not helping me to focus on my reading xD
My books are spine cracked, dog eared and written in ...and do you know what? I bloody love them!
I’ve been listening to audiobooks more often recently and I’ve been listening to them in large chunks while I work on painting. It really gets me in the zone for painting and also immerses me in the book.
I think Kleenex are the universal bookmark lol we readers are nasally people
Unrelated, but I think this is the prettiest makeup look ever. It compliments you so well, the eyeshadow's a gorgeous colour :)
I kinda love those random things used as bookmarks. I like cutting up the Clipper-teaboxes (they've got such pretty pictures) and use them as bookmarks, which make the book smell a bit tea-y (which I think is really nice). I get a lot of books from the library and every time I'm a little sad I can't write in the margins of those books...
This was just such a cosy feel good just what I needed kind of video. Thank you Leena!!! Also: mostly just one book at a time, love bookmarks that mean something to me (my sister made me a lovely one), and can and will read anywhere and everywhere
Bookmarks... I have two of the same kind (one is always lost in a book I started and forgot about/decided to "come back to") that I switch between all my books I read, they have this elastic on them that wraps around the book and holds it closed when you're not using it, I've had them for ages, love them.
And then there's the new books I start on the way home from somewhere and they just live with whatever receipt or scrap paper I found in my bag at the time
I also love reading a book more than once and underlining in a different color. Sometimes I understand something in a different way, or I'm drawn to another passage - I agree its very interesting!
I like paperbacks that fit in my pockets. I’m befuddled by the bookstores supplying the large paperbacks when a book is first released and maybe the smaller one later on, silliness! Does anyone prefer the large? The font isn’t any bigger so…
I love small books that fit in my pocket or purse!
Definitely prefer paperback over hardcover.
I'm a graphic designer for my local library and make a LOT of bookmarks. I use a lot for my reading.
Struggle really hard to DNF a book, if I can't read it physically I moved to an audiobook, if I'm still bored I listen to it at 2x speed and if I'm still super bored then I go read a summary and get it over with. But I'm just as likely as leaving it on my reading list for years until I get to it.
Dog ear FOREVER!
I do the bottom corner to mark my place, and the top corner for a page I'm going to go back to and reread or take notes
Some of us are just being INTRODUCED to 2006, Leena! 😝
Leena!!!! I remember a few years ago you had a video about YA books/authors “doing it right” and it just popped into my head today! I looked for the video but it looks like it’s either been taken down or made private, I would LOVE an updated version of that video! Maybe as part of miserymas??? 🤗
I could never understand my friends at University who needed the TV, radio, or any music playing when they were studying ... I always needed silence to be able to absorb what I was revising. It's the same with reading for pleasure ... I need complete silence to immerse myself in the characters and world I am reading about. I prefer to read when I am alone at home, but do enjoy reading on a long train journey.
I love your videos, and how they always make me think and reflect!
Have you read The Heroine’s Journey by Gail Carriger? It’s a non-fiction analysis of storytelling themes and why we connect with them the way we do.
Post-its are the best bookmarks, you can place them exactly where you stopped reading , and they won't fall out of the book when you are carrying the books around. Also I like to write something stupid on them.
Kid me was OBSESSED with buying books from charity shops, and my most beloved books were often deliberately water damaged after I’d read them a few times - I read a LOT of handmedown, 5th hand books, and I really enjoyed the textures of “loved” books vs “pristine” books - I still prefer a water damaged book texture to this day, but I stopped deliberately dousing my books around age 12, mostly because I got a kindle, started reading fanfic, and began reading much longer series - going from 2-4 books in a series to 12 books per series within a year made me realize that water damaged books take up too much space to be conductive to Max Book Storage 😅 I also never doused a brand new book until it hit the 2-5yr mark, or I knew I would be the only owner - as the youngest in the family, I had a large gap between me and the next kid in the family (a full decade - cousins) I didn’t end up passing many of my books down.
Can you recommend some books with important marginalia? I’ve read ‚S’ and loved it but I don’t know where to look for others like that.
"fun fact" even though tags are not done often in the HUGE parts of booktube they are still done in many spaces of booktube. I think you would like the "are you like jane austen" tag.
I just started a non fiction about women and men and language, really good but in norwegian.
I ALWAYS have 6-12 books reading atm.
Nothing hypes me up more than this intro music with the skeletons
Bookmarks are either gifts or freebies I get when buying books, but I go for receipts, a thread from sewing or a leftover yarn from crocheting, and I feel less bad if I lose those
I have to stop at a page that ends with a sentence? Else I have to re-read so much to find where I stopped.
I can't listen to music because that distracts me so much - I can watch RUclips and play a game and listen to music all at the same time but I need the quiet for reading.
Reading on public transport and in cars makes me sick and dizzy :(
I hate to abandon books after a few chapters but I just put them down and continue if I feel like it. On the other hand, I read different books and essays all the time for uni, aside from my freetime reading list.
Unfortunately audiobooks take me so long because I have some audio processing issues, especially in English, and I really have to focus on them and can't do anything except listening to them which kinda defeats the purpose imo.
I skip pages if it's really foreseeable? So if I know what's gonna happen and I don't wanna deal with it I skip. Forrest Gump for example, never watched the movie but the books was so foreseeable at times....
Break the spines, bend those as much as possible so I can hold them in one hand
I love buying second hand since it's really inexpensive, I get many books for like 2-3 Euros, which is dirtcheap, but I don't like annotations and underlines when I first read a book because I want to form my own opinions and get a relation to the text and other people's annotations keep me from doing that
To be honest, the only way I read these days is via audio books. I've noticed that I have to be doing something while listening to audio books (or watching youtube for that matter). If I don't have two things going on at once I get this antsy drive in my stomach that I can't stand. So if I were reading a physical book, I would most definitely also need music playing to help keep the antsy energy at bay. I should probably get checked out for ADHD but I don't have that kind of money right now.
Heheheee love that my bday is in december for once- i feel like this is a little gift from the universe
I agree I can't read and listen to music I need complete silence or else I get distracted. I don't know how people do it
Your eye make up is so on point this video, |'m in awe
i adore this video! it was so neat to learn about your reading habits!!
really enjoying this series
Obsessed with your eye makeup.
£3.83/hour, that is tellingly specific...we all have those jobs, ha!
I read poetry and plays out loud and sometimes nonfiction thats hard to understand
Does anyone else here actually read books out loud? I ask everyone I meet and so far it is still just me and small children 👀
Hahaha I wish it was more socially acceptable 😂 I used to love reading out loud in class, I put voices on and completely embarrassed myself but had a great time
I read out loud to my rabbit
I study with flashcards and say the answers out loud, does that count?
@@nr5076 I love that 😭
i normaly dont, but the last book i read ,the invisible life of addie larue, is super long slow fantasy stuff and i liked it but it was just so slow, that i started to read parts out loud to myself to appreciate the beautiful use of language more and also motivate myself to get through the story lacking parts, do yeah i do that but Im new to the business (;
Look, Leena, not to be too consumerist here…but would you mind telling us what that gorgeous eyeshadow is?
Reading in a car or bus makes me feel sick and always has, and my bff has never forgiven me for telling her that. When she was a kid, she could read in the car with no bother and as soon as I told her it makes me sick, it started to make HER sick and she hates me for that 😅
I read poetry out loud almost always or mouth the words under my breath, but that's the only time for me. Also a big fan of reading multiple books at once.. but now I get to that point of the year where I'm only half way through my reading goal and I have like 5 books that i'm ~halfway through lol
I absolutely always have at least three books on the go: a fiction on my e-reader, something on audio, and a non-fiction in physical form. Because they're different media I have no problem switching between them, because my brain has been trained in what to expect in what format.
Next year I'm going to try to start reading hard copy fiction again!
only tangentially related to this tag but i LOVE stickers and always buy cute ones when i see them and eventually i ran out of space on like my laptop and journals/sketchbooks so now i cover all my hardcover books in stickers under the dust jackets 😳🥴
I always HATED reading out loud but the last couple of books ive read ive read bits out loud to my boyfriend and its been really nice. Its not the same - i can’t do accents as well out loud as in my head but it was just nice to be able to share something that means so much without either ranting at him or forcing him to do something he doesn’t like (its not a big reader but likes the stores).
I used to very much be a one book at a time sort of person, it's weird but it never even crossed my mind that reading multiple books at once was an option. It's only thanks to booksta/booktube that I now read multiple. I usually try to have one fiction, one non-fiction and one audiobook on the go at once.
I tend have two or three books on the go at any one time, my partner has many more, we have a glass jar (was a pickle jar in previous life) in our living room full of bookmarks for when they are inevitably needed.
CANNOT have TV/music on at the same time as reading
My sister has been a multi reader since we were kids! 😅 Like, three books open at once. I always thought she was nuts!
Anthropological Marginalia--next band name!
As an avid reader, your book related content is always a pleasure to see (although I do enjoy all your other content too!).
After your book surgery, I wanted to ask for some recommendations on a couple of books related subjects.
I generally read for pleasure, but next year want to work on getting more non-fiction in and learning more about the world around me, ideally one NF per month. What books would you recommend that start off easy to get me into the practice, and cover a broad range of subjects?
Also, I'm currently a year into running a book club and want to improve on our discussions. One of the other parts of reading I struggle with is, is picking out themes and motifs that make for a good discussion from our chosen books. Do you have any recommendations for material that would help me to think more critically about what I'm reading? Or give me help with choosing books that could easily give more discussion points?
Would love any help on the above!
Leena - can you please do a video on learning how to read faster? I'm a life long book lover but it takes me forever to get through print books, which are often more accessible than audiobooks. Thanks!!
I’d love this as well!
THREE POUND 83 AN HOUR, WHAT, THAT'S ABSOLUTELY CRIMINAL
Lol it was 2009 so for under 21s, totally legal but yes, morally dubious 😜
Voicing an audiobook??? I would love to team up with you on that...Dulci's Legacy would probably be the best fit... 💗🙌🏼
The only spines I try hard not to break are library book spines (if they're not already broken) as those books are the work horses of the reading world and the best i can do to postpone their shelf life I will
Sounds are weird...washing machine is too loud in my apt; what gets me is when it's pretty quiet BUT there's some odd beeping noise from outside that disappears when I open the window and try to pinpoint it GAHHHH
I stretch my spines. I don’t break them and I don’t keep it as new. 😝
1. I usually read in bed but it isn't the most ideal space. Mainly because the lighting is bad.
2. BOOKMARKS!!!! I collect them and most of them are homemade, usually from scrap pieces of craft paper. I also like it when the bookmark matches the aesthetic or genre of the book.
3. I can stop anywhere but ending at a chapter is very satisfying and convenient when I pick it back up.
4. I try to avoid eating or drinking while reading. The other day I had hot chocolate and spilled it all over a library book...
5. CANNOT. NO DISTRACTIONS OR ELSE MY BRAINCELLS SUFFER.
6. I prefer one at a time but I've been getting overwhelmed with my long TBR so I've been doing a few at a time.
7. Everywhere but mostly at home. I can read in the car :)
8. Silent in my head.
9. I don't skip ahead.
10. Break the spine I think?
11. Nope! But I'm going to annotate a book for the first time soon. Will be a second hand book.
Hey Leena! Loving the vlogmas so far!! Just so's you know the link to the series playlist says it doesn't exist... and I don't want to miss any when I'm cathcing up on videos : D
I offended on how early this video finished :D
if you have a ridiculous number of bookmarks what i do is put one in each book as i buy it so all my unread books have bookmarks in the front and all the read ones have bookmarks in the back :)
(i also love perfume tester slips as bookmarks, they're the right shape, they smell nice, they're gucci)
I use the little tag inside the lid of my cigarette pack
Leena: read on buses, at work, can pick up anywhere she left off
Charger: *buzzing*
Leena’s Brain: * *tv static* *
Ah book tags really make me want to start a youtube to be a booktuber