Richard's blog

Book reading instead of Social Media

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by

richard
in
Reading Time: 2 minutes
Table of Contents
  1. Reading So far this year:
  2. Books I am currently reading
  3. Long periods of focused attention
  4. Reading devices

At the beginning of the year I said that I would prioritise book reading over Social Media because I feel that the disconnect between reader and audience has grown to such an extent that you benefit more from reading books than Facebook and Twitter Timelines. 

Reading So far this year:

Abandon : A book about a mining town whose inhabitants disappeared from one day to the next.

Snowbound: About a father and daughter who end up travelling a big distance

Dark Matter: A book about all the alternative infinite number of realities we could experience as a result of every decision we make

Gray Mountain: A book about the American coal mining industry and its disregard for human rights

Books I am currently reading

The Written World: The Power of Stories to Shape People, History, Civilization: This is an interesting booking tracing the history of the written world from the earliest Cuneiforms to modern technology. I have just finished reading about the Printing press and “The Republic of letters” chapter. 

Churchill’s Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare: The Mavericks Who Plotted Hitler’s Defeat: The audible version of this book is entertaining. It is read in such a manner that I had to remind myself that this book is meant to be factual. It’s a fun read. 

La bataille de Normandie, 6 juin-25 août 1944: 80 jours en enfer It is easy to think of D-Day as a one day event but through the reading of this book we see how Northern France suffered and yet rejoiced at the liberation by French, Canadian, American, British, Polish and other armies. It looks at the personalities, locations and tactics used over a period of months. 

Long periods of focused attention

By replacing Social media with book reading I feel that I am going back to a habit that many of us lost with the emergence of social media. We went from reading chapters a day to reading tweets and Facebook entries. We went from the long form to the short form. 

The short form of Tweets and Facebook posts was rewarding when it was about conversations and keeping up with friends. As the focus on friends has dwindled and as the quality of content has decreased so the pull factor of long-form content such as books came back. 

Reading devices

I have a kindle Paperwhite and a Kobo Aura H20. I prefer reading on e-readers, especially when I spend several hours a day on rainy weekends reading. The batteries last for a long time and there are no distractions. Mobile phone screens slow down my reading speed and tablets don’t feel as comfortable for reading. 

I use my mobile phone and an ipod classic when I read audiobooks.