Notes on Reading

Welcome, friends, to another year of my reading life!

Every year at about this time, I take a minute to reflect on what I read, and whether writing about it continues to serve my personal goals. I started this project because I read so much, and I have such intimate experiences with the books I enjoy. I wanted to capture some of the intellectual and emotional excitement I feel when I read something wonderful. Plus, writing about the duds is really fun!

In the past year, I’ve found myself reading a lot more non-fiction – and for much of it, the boundary of whether it’s “work reading” or “pleasure reading” isn’t really clear. Part of this is the impact of e-reading; I’m much more willing to read non-fiction in my free time, particularly non-fiction in or near my field, when I know I can easily highlight and retrieve important passages. Another part, though, is realizing just how much of what I’m ostensibly reading for “fun” actually loops back into the bigger picture of what I’m thinking about professionally.

What this means is that I may be writing about some of the non-fiction I read outside the context of these book posts, either as reviews or as I work out specific ideas. I won’t be writing about those books a second time in my reading list posts; I’ll list them, and point to the other post I’ve made.

The other big change of 2011 is that I seem to have a group of readers who come for the reading list posts – not for the talk about games, creativity, feminism, or anything else. So if you’re reading along with me, welcome! I hope you enjoy your reading life in 2012 as much as I plan to!

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