Purposeful Reading

I’ve long made it a practice to read at least 50 books a year – half fiction, half non-fiction. I read fiction for the experience of the story and the pleasure of the writing. Consequently, I read every paragraph and every word, sometimes more than once. I read non-fiction with an entirely different approach. I call it purposeful reading. I read to understand and judge the thesis, and to collect details that might be useful later on. Since that’s my goal, I almost never read non-fiction books word-for-word. I developed a system for consuming them quickly that suits my purpose very well. (You can read about it here.)

I’m telling you this to let you know two things: When I review a non-fiction book,  I’m not necessarily recommending that you read it. In fact, unless I say otherwise, my review is meant to give you the gist of what I got from the book, along with some key details, so that you can choose not to read it if you wish.