I started tracking the books I've read in 2005. They are listed by year, the title and the author. Somewhere along the way I started to rate some of the books, mostly by love/hate. Then I started to write a few words about some of them. Rating them and writing a few words helps me remember something about the story and the author. Tracking them helps me to not pick up a book to read that I've already read-NOT.
I would also suggest reading your book along other media formats: maybe the book has a guidebook, tv program, or audiobook connected with it. In particular, I've found listening to an audio book while reading along definitely helps you remember and learn material. I had great success with this approach while reading War and Peace with the Book Group, and also reading Robert Alter's translation of the Old Testament. It also works extremely well with poetry--really help to capture the cadence of the poetry.
Any recs on programs that track your reading? Goodreads seems pretty simple but I was annoyed by the rating and suggestions to just get into the app. Any others?
Yeah I use Goodreads, but only as a secondary tracker. I actually just use Google Sheets! I'll share my tracking system in a couple weeks, but these are the columns I use:
I started tracking the books I've read in 2005. They are listed by year, the title and the author. Somewhere along the way I started to rate some of the books, mostly by love/hate. Then I started to write a few words about some of them. Rating them and writing a few words helps me remember something about the story and the author. Tracking them helps me to not pick up a book to read that I've already read-NOT.
I would also suggest reading your book along other media formats: maybe the book has a guidebook, tv program, or audiobook connected with it. In particular, I've found listening to an audio book while reading along definitely helps you remember and learn material. I had great success with this approach while reading War and Peace with the Book Group, and also reading Robert Alter's translation of the Old Testament. It also works extremely well with poetry--really help to capture the cadence of the poetry.
Any recs on programs that track your reading? Goodreads seems pretty simple but I was annoyed by the rating and suggestions to just get into the app. Any others?
Yeah I use Goodreads, but only as a secondary tracker. I actually just use Google Sheets! I'll share my tracking system in a couple weeks, but these are the columns I use:
Date Finished
Title
Author
Gender
Pages
Genre
Categories/Keywords
Yr Published
Format (paperback, audio, library, etc.)
Rating (out of 5 stars)