How to Read More and 7 Unforgettable Books I Loved Reading

If you want to know how to read more, keep reading. Below you’ll find actual tips to help you read more and books that will actually make you want to keep reading.

I love to read. When I was getting ready to start writing Gentle: Rest More, Stress Less and Live the Life You Actually Want, I was worried that I wouldn’t have reading time. I was wrong. It took me about a year to write my book and I read at least 50 books during that time. I think it was because I didn’t force any of my own writing. It wasn’t hard and I never felt the need to push through. Writing Gentle was mostly … gentle.

There were a few “uh oh” moments, like when after getting feedback from my editor, I completely rewrote the first third of the book. Or, when my editor gave her notice the week before the manuscript was due. Mostly though, I wrote at a pace that didn’t stress me out. The launch was another story. I would write a new book every year if I didn’t have to market and promote it. A new book every five years seems to work better because there’s enough time in between for me to forget how hard the post-writing part is.

How I like to read books

I read books I can hold in my hand, read some books on Kindle and listen to audiobooks from Libby or Libro.fm. I listen to audiobooks with Libro.fm instead of Audible for a few reasons.

For starters, you get a couple of free audiobooks when you sign up with Libro.fm. Next, you can choose a local bookstore to support with each order. And, Libro.fm allows you to download your books, unlike Audible where you have to listen to them on the platform. Because you can download your audiobooks, you can share them with friends. When friends share their audiobooks with me, I listen with an app called Book Player. I’m sure there are other options! And in case there is any confusion, listening to a book counts as reading a book.

7 Unforgettable Books I Loved Reading

I keep track of my reading, both what I’ve read and what I want to read in the StoryGraph app. I’m using descriptions from StoryGraph for the books below because I am the absolute worst at describing what a book is about. I will rave and tell you how much I love a book but if you ask me to tell you about it, I forget everything I loved about it. Is that a toxic trait? Either way, thank goodness there are great book descriptions that already exist. Here are the books that I loved reading over the last year.

1. Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith

A breathtaking, joy-filled novel about the people we love, the secrets we keep, and the enduring power of family, from the bestselling author of The Unsinkable Greta James.A captivating journey and an ode to forgiveness that takes readers across all fifty states, Fun for the Whole Family brims with heart and resonates long after the final page. I listened to this book and thanks to the brilliant narration of Lauren Graham, I never wanted it to end. This was a delight to listen to.

2. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

France, 1714: In a moment of desperation, a young woman named Adeline meets a dangerous stranger and makes a terrible mistake. As she realizes the limitations of her Faustian bargain-being able to live forever, without being able to be remembered by anyone she sees- Addie chooses to flee her small village, as everything she once held dear is torn away.

But there are still dreams to be had, and a life to live, and she is determined to find excitement and satisfaction in the wide, beckoning world-even if she will be doomed to be alone forever. It will be three hundred years before she stumbles into a hidden bookstore and discovers someone who can remember her name-and suddenly, everything changes again.

This is not my typical genre and I am so glad I gave it a chance. It was so nice to read something that I couldn’t connect to real life. This book was a true escape.

3. True Biz by Sara Nović

This revelatory novel plunges readers into the halls of a residential school for the deaf, where they’ll meet Charlie, a rebellious transfer student who’s never met another deaf person before; Austin, the school’s golden boy, whose world is rocked when his baby sister is born hearing; and February, the headmistress, who is fighting to keep her school open and her marriage intact, but might not be able to do both.

This is a story of sign language and lip-reading, cochlear implants and civil rights, isolation and injustice, first love and loss, and, above all, great persistence, daring, and joy. Absorbing and assured, idiosyncratic and relatable, this is an unforgettable journey into the Deaf community and a universal celebration of human connection.

I read a hardcover version of this but I’ve heard that the audiobook is wonderful. Sometimes, when I’m reading a lot, I forget the plot line of a particular book but this book is unforgettable.

4. The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow

In a sprawling mansion filled with peculiar treasures, January Scaller is a curiosity herself. As the ward of the wealthy Mr. Locke, she feels little different from the artifacts that decorate the halls: carefully maintained, largely ignored, and utterly out of place.

Then she finds a strange book. A book that carries the scent of other worlds, and tells a tale of secret doors, of love, adventure and danger. Each page turn reveals impossible truths about the world and January discovers a story increasingly entwined with her own.

Reading The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue opened the door to The Ten Thousand Doors of January for me. I was hooked from the beginning and invested in January’s journey all the way through. This book was another beautiful escape. I’m sensing a pattern here.

5. Here After by Amy Lin

Amy Lin never expected to find a love like the one she shares with her husband, Kurtis, a gifted young architect who pulls her toward joy, adventure, and greater self-acceptance. But on a hot August morning, on the eve of the newlyweds’ big move to Toronto, thirty-one-year-old Kurtis heads out to run a half-marathon with Amy’s family. It’s the last time she sees her husband alive.

What follows is a rich and unflinchingly honest accounting of her life with Kurtis, the vortex created by such a loss, and the ongoing struggle Amy faces trying to understand her own experience in the context of commonly held “truths” about what the grieving process looks like.

This was a moving story but what I loved most was the style of writing. It was something that felt brand new. Keep tissues nearby. Amy’s writing was captivating. I read this book in one sitting.

6. The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah

With courage, grace, and powerful insight, bestselling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women’s war. The Nightingale tells the stories of two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals, passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path toward survival, love, and freedom in German-occupied, war-torn France–a heartbreakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the durability of women. It is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime.

Has everyone already read this book? I don’t know why I waited so long. I wish I hadn’t finished it while on vacation because crying into my Kindle by the pool felt wrong.

7. Sandwich by Catherine Newman

Sandwiched between her children who are adult enough to be fun but still young enough to need her, and her parents who are alive and healthy, Rocky wants to preserve this golden moment forever. This one precious week when everything is in balance; everything is in flux.

But every family has its secrets and hers is no exception. With her body in open revolt and surprises invading her peaceful haven, the perfectly balanced seesaw of Rocky’s life is tipping towards change…

Woah this book. It’s a must read. And I highly recommend following author, Catherine Newman on Substack.

Choosing only 7 favorites was a challenge, if this was about 10 books I adored, I would have also included: I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself: One Woman’s Pursuit of Pleasure in Paris by Glynnis MacNicol (audiobook), The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley and How to End a Love Story by Kulin Kuang

How to read more

If you want to get back into reading, follow her advice, “This year I made the resolution to read every single day. I didn’t make any commitment to how many pages, or chapters, or anything like that, only simply to pick up a book and read every day. The results have stuck! I have read more this year than I have in a long time.”

If you want to read more, read what you enjoy. If you are reading a book that you don’t enjoy, stop reading it and try something else. Bring your book everywhere and challenge yourself to show up 10 minutes early to everything. Then you have an extra 10 minutes to read. Bonus: you won’t be scrolling your phone while you wait.

When you read my new book, Gentle and leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads, let me know via email and I’ll mail you a signed bookplate.

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