[minouye]

Here's what I do. If I get a book recommendation, I immediately buy it and put it on a bookshelf. Every time I walk by, I scan the shelf and pick what speaks to me at that given time: fiction, non-fiction, cookbooks, science, history, classics, short-story collections, biographies, etc. If you match your what you read to your mood and frame of mind, you can consume and retain information much more quickly and enjoyably. And having the book on hand is really important since my interests and mood change from day to day.

I also try follow some other general rules, that work for me:

* Read several books at once, esp. across disciplines.

* Read paper books.

* You don't need to finish books. Stopping mid-way is fine (still have problems with this!)

* Seek out durable works over bestsellers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect)

* Read across disciplines

* Write in books and make notes. Write up notes a couple of weeks after finishing (create your own commonplace book)

* Avoid audiobooks (if you want to retain the content). I just can't retain when I listen while driving/multitasking, but like listening to fiction for fun.

* Tag interesting books/papers cited in the books you like. Look them up and read them too.

* Find interesting/prolific readers on Goodreads. Lookup the books they read, esp. the ones you've never heard of.

* Let other people know that you like reading, and ask what they've read recently. When they read interesting books, they'll recommend them to you.

[madcaptenor]

One problem with buying books when they're recommended is that it's a lot easier to buy books than read them. I recently went through my shelves and counted the books I owned but have not read and was shocked.

So my current method is now to read the books that past-me thought sounded interesting.

[minouye]

Yeah that's true. And having a small apartment makes that problematic as well.

I like this Umberto Eco anecdote: https://fs.blog/2013/06/the-antilibrary/. Having a lot of unread books around is a good reminder of how much there is to read, learn, and experience. And it makes reading instead of turning to Netflix an easier decision.

[veddox]

> If I get a book recommendation, I immediately buy it and put it on a bookshelf.

That's fine if you can afford it ;-) Living on a student's budget, I limit myself to two new books a month, or sometimes three. But then I make sure I pick good books, and really try my very best to finish them. Doesn't always work, but it does mean that I've completely read ~90% of the books on my shelves. (Although I will often read books in parallel, switching as the mood strikes.)

I started my "two books a month" habit about three years ago and have found it a valuable habit to have. I've read some excellent books, learnt a ton (from widely different fields) - and there is a certain joy of anticipation in carefully selecting "this month's books".

[wmil]

> You don't need to finish books. Stopping mid-way is fine (still have problems with this!)

I think this is important with non-fiction. A lot of books can be wrapped up nicely in 80 pages, but the publisher wants 300. So they get a lot of unneeded padding at the end.

[atulatul]

Somewhat similar to what I follow. Although these days I don't have a particular preference to paper books vs ebooks. And probably durable vs bestseller may be at the top of the list.

> interesting/prolific readers on Goodreads Could you share a few?