“Bleak House” progress report. Normally I enjoy reading, but tend to do so at the end of the day. and if the book is Because this is a big complex book I have had a completely different approach to my normal reading. How is it working out?
1. Yes the commitment to half an hour a day – in the day – has been easy to maintain. In fact it has been a bit of a revelation! I have given myself permission to read at times when I would not normally read. Because it is a “good” book that I “ought” to read and I have the time limit, it has been easier to do this every day than I imagined.Setting the boundary at 30 minutes has helped me to concentrate, and make consistent progress, which I don’t think I would have achieved if I had just read when I want to, or when I “have time.”
2. Am I enjoying the book? Yes – and sometimes I end up laughing out loud. Knowing that I am keeping to a promise I made to myself to read it could be helping. The book itself is a bit of a bonus!
3. What is it like reading on the Kindle? You can alter the font size to suit you – which I have done. As the Kindle is not a screen but a type of ink it is much easier to read than a computer screen what ever position you hold it in.
The Kindle is much much better than reading a book with poor paper. Often the classics are reproduced on thin paper, with small print, or alternatively on thick paper where the ink nearly disappears into the page. (Which I hate!)
But I am missing having the context of the book. You end up having a more myopic view and you can’t (of course) tell how much you have read simply by touch. I hadn’t realised this would matter but at the moment it still does.
As this is a complex book with a large cast of characters it would be useful to quickly flip back to the beginning and see the cheat sheet on who they all are. But I don’t want to lose my place and it feels a bit tiring to find it again.
The other disconcerting thing is that there are no page numbers. I have altered the font size so suppose that it is too complicated a process to realign page numbers. At the bottom I can tell what percentage of the book I have read.. which at the moment stands at 17%.
So there are definitely things I am having to get used to. So far so good, though.