[janvdberg]

I love this! Everyone should keep a list like this (self-hosted). It also makes me a little bit sad, as there are SO MANY books and this shows that a lifetime of reading will only get you to maybe 2000 books.

Choose wisely what you read.

[Loic]

Or stop reading if you feel it is not worth your time.

[gnuj3]

Yes, this is something I had to learn over the years. I always had this notion that I HAD to finish something (book, movie) to be able to express the opinion on it. Now, if I dont enjoy it I just stop reading and when I’m asked what did I think of it I simply answer that I didnt finish because xyz. It gives you so much more time resulting in reading something you actually enjoy.

[hamburglar]

Yes, I used to have this compulsion as well. I still remember the book I was reading, at the age of 31, when I realized this was counter-productive and that I was slogging through things I didn't enjoy because of some misdirected completeness requirement I'd imposed on myself. Gravity's Rainbow by Pynchon. Page 90. Since then I've had a low tolerance for authors who can't be bothered to make me want to continue hearing their ideas.

[AlbertCory]

Right. More and more nowadays with non-fiction, I read a few chapters, realize I've already heard everything the author has to say, and drop it. Life's too short.

[danenania]

It's also very common for non-fiction books to have 20 pages of substance, but be padded out to 200 or more with repetition and filler.

[AlbertCory]

Indeed. Read those 20 pages, say "OK, I got it," and skip the padding.

[tomcam]

No one who downvoted this is a serious reader. I would much rather jettison a bad book or movie than waste the one life I have on material that doesn’t make my life better in some way.

[StormChaser_5]

I think it may be being down voted as it can he read as saying stop reading entirely rather than just stop reading a particular book, ie an attack on reading as an activity. Doubt the comment was meant that way though and I agree with you, dropping a particular book if it's not rewarding is something I do although I do still struggle with myself when doing so.

[Loic]

Thank you for your comment.

We have 1000's of books in our house. We read a lot and I would have not imagined a second that my comment could be interpreted this way.

So, yes, drop the specific book and enjoy another one is my advice.

[JasonFruit]

Absolutely do! I was reading John Calhoun's Disquisition on Government, which is not very long, but extremely dense, and full of those passages that sound at first as though they mean the opposite of the author's point, but work around to it by degrees. I struggled with it for a while before I realized that the wordiness was a disguise for poor or non-existent reasoning — at least, that's how it seemed to me — and went to read something better.

[vasco]

What does it matter if it's self hosted? That requirement would make 99% of readers not do it. Goodreads sucks but for the majority of people will be way better.

[janvdberg]

I am biased: https://j11g.com/2019/11/16/foster-how-to-build-your-own-boo...

[pneumatic1]

I have been looking for something to build as a way to learn Rust and I think I just found my inspiration. Thanks!

[mhh__]

Build your own temple

[dredmorbius]

A lifetime is about 4,500 weeks.

For most people, a book is probably a multi-week investment, though lighter fare can go quicker. You can also skim, or read segments only, or quit bad books quickly. I recommend each of these where appropriate.

There are roughly 300,000 "traditionally" published books printed each year in the United States (Bowker ISBN registrations), a million or three including self-published. The US Library of Congress has 40 million catalogued titles, and Google estimated about 140 million books published (through its Google Books project) as of 2015 or so. You will sample only a tiny portion of the world's literature.

The most-read books of all time are, in rough order: The Bible, the Quran, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, all reporting (with various degrees of precision and accuracy) ~0.5 -- 5 billion copies), then possibly Cervantes Don Quixote, and the Harry Potter series. Three of those, at least, are principally propaganda, in the original and/or modern senses.

A well-established historical novel may sell roughly 200 million or so copies, as with A Tale of Two Cities or The Little Prince.

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_books>

The Facebook (and now TikTok) homepages and/or app screens now dwarf these.

Quantity ... has its benefits, but also disadvantages. "Of the reading of books there is no end" says The Preacher in Ecclesiastes.

I recommend reading well, I've suggested Great Books as at least a good starting library, though my other suggestion is to have a good guiding question and to follow that.

Keep in mind that following recent trends, news, gossip, etc., can engross all your time and attention with very little long-term staying value. I don't remain wholly ignorant of what's happening, but I try to dip very lightly from that pitcher.

From a recent comment of mine: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32669503>

[Thrymr]

> The most-read books of all time are, in rough order: The Bible, the Quran, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, all reporting (with various degrees of precision and accuracy) ~0.5 -- 5 billion copies)

Surely the Bible is among the most un-read books in history as well, with all of the copies sitting in hotel rooms and on family shelves unopened.

[dredmorbius]

Interesting suggestion, though it'd be interesting to see how that varies across titles with copies.

A book selling one copy which is never read would have a higher percentage-unread.

Otherwise, as total copies increase, the absolute magnitude of unread copies would likely increase proportionately.

Keep in mind that copies presented to multiple potential readers (as with, say, Gidion's Bible, typically found in hotel rooms) would likely have a greater chance of being opened at least once over its lifetime.

There's also the interesting question suggested: what book has the highest readers-per-copy ratio? And how should that be scaled by total readers? I'm inclined on general principle to suggest the ratio * log(n) where n is total copies produced. That penalises very low sales volumes, but discounts greater total print runs.

I'd suspect it would probably be a romance novel.

[coldtea]

>as there are SO MANY books and this shows that a lifetime of reading will only get you to maybe 2000 books.

I get through about 15 books a month - 2000 would be like 10-12 years, not a lifetime.

[kleiba]

I have three little kids, I get through about one page a week.

[coldtea]

Don't give up! They will have a phase were they wont want much to do with their uncool parent between 14-17 anyway (teenagers be like that), where you can exploit for time to read. And if not, they'll be out for college at 18 or so. After which you still have 2 or so decades you can still read at will (you might not have the money for books though, due to tuition fees and such).

So the parent commenter's generalization "at most 2000 books in a lifetime" is hardly accurate - and has been way bypassed by any bookworm I know.

Heck, one can read 2000 books before the time they have kids too. I had already read about that number by 20-25 starting from about 10-11 or so with sci-fi stuff like Verne and Asimov, and moving to literature and non-fiction soon.

I know because I need to pack them every time I move - it's the most labour intensive part of a move to take the library with us, in 100s of cardboard boxes, which then stay unopened for 3-6 months after moving to a new house.

[jcynix]

Teach your kids the love of books and when they reach school age, they will be sitting in a cosy corner and read books. I started reading at the age of six and "plundered" the local library with eight or nine. That allowed my parents to read too (again).

[kleiba]

All my kids love books, don't worry. But in the "one page per week" statement above, I excluded children's books. ;-)

[hmcamp]

Audiobooks my friend. Listening at +1.5x (playback speed) helps

[capableweb]

Maybe its just me, but listening to audiobooks are absolutely impossible for me if I want to retain anything of the material I'm reading/listening to. First problem is that I seem to forget everything as soon as I stop listening, so next time I listen, I have no memory of what happened before. Second problem is that sometimes my brain just tunes it out, and I catch myself 5-10 minutes later not having to actually listened to any of it, having to go back again.

This happens both when I'm listening to audiobooks and doing something else, or when just sitting and doing nothing when listening. I don't have the same problem with reading, I can do that with high focus for hours without any problem.

[coldtea]

>Second problem is that sometimes my brain just tunes it out, and I catch myself 5-10 minutes later not having to actually listened to any of it, having to go back again.

I think the key here is to listen while doing something undistracting and boring -- so not like driving (which requires your attention often), but rather e.g. on the treadmill or commuting in some longer distance, where you can passively zone one (eg. long train commute, not 3 subway stops).

[JasonFruit]

It gets better when they're a little older. I'm now back to a book per week or so, now that they're 9 and older, and I homeschool them.

[mellavora]

There is more wisdom than you might think in "Cute Baby Animals" (one of the best baby books of all time)

[irrational]

This is why I’m surprised by people rewatching tv shows and movies, rereading books, etc. You have a limited amount of time before you die and an, effectively, infinite amount of material to consume. Most of it is dross, but enough isn’t that there is no time to revisit.

[egypturnash]

Some things have depths they only reveal when you are ready for them.

Some things are just comfortable and fun to revisit.

Some things are even both.

[keymon-o]

Would you apply that opinion to music as well? Yes, it is shorter and more practical type of media, but people tend to consume it until it "wears off". Other media consumption is much more demanding, complex and immersive and it is sometimes a drag to do it more than once, but it can be worth it if it made that deep impression on you.

I don't consume a lot of media for the same reason of wasting my time, plus trial and error of finding satisfying material takes additional quantity of time I don't have. With that I justify occasional media reconsumption as I can get equally satisfying emotional response from rewatched material.

Also, why would death play any role on how many different material one needs to consume?

[irrational]

I'm the wrong one to ask that question of. I don't ever listen to music. It does nothing for me. I probably have Musical Anodesia.

As for death, you can't consume any more material after death.

[lornemalvo]

There are shows/movies with so much depth, that you grasp some details (about the plot, characters, composition or the art design) only when watching it a second or third time.