I agree. So often the results of our choices are influenced by just luck so it's foolish to use that information to influence others.

My parents were deeply against a university education for me. They thought anything beyond a certificate program to be a waste of funds.

My parents barely finished high school and were successful and so they were adamant that my experience would be the same. It wasn't.

I worked hard, got decent reviews, got promotions but never earned above poverty wages.

They were furious when I went to college and didn't attend a single graduation. They still refuse to acknowledge they were wrong instead taking my failure to achieve success as evidence of my laziness.

They heavily influenced who I dated as well which also went horribly.

I'm encouraging my daughter to make the educational decisions that make the most sense to her. For me the right choice was a university education, but for others it's trade school. She needs to examine everything and make the choice that feels right to her because it's her life.

I think any advice we might give should be limited to how we did something if someone else is curious- but never whether or not someone should do something.

Meh, I have something like 900 unread books. I think.

I bought an adjustable metal frame for around $350 on Wayfair. I doubt it will adjust forever, but the frame is sturdy.

I was like that at 21.

It's not necessarily a guarantee that you have internalized misogyny, but for me that was 100% the case.

Or it could just be a fluke.

I read books at different speeds all the time.

I read Mrs Frisby and the Rats of Nimh in a couple hours yesterday. But, I could only make it through around 30ish pages of War and Peace before my brain was tired.

I also read nonfiction a lot more slowly than regular fiction- though some literary fiction can be just as slow to read.

A lot of it is vocabulary familiarity or situational familiarity. If the characters are in a situation I've been in before or am familiar with, the reading is faster than if it's a completely foreign situation. It takes longer to conjure the image in my head if it's not a familiar image.

I try not to pay attention to page numbers while I'm reading because it takes me out of the book- but, yeah, sometimes I finish an hour of reading and I've knocked out 100 pages, sometimes just 20 pages if it's something really challenging.

All that is reading in my only language. I would imagine there'd be even more variation reading in a second language.

What you are running up against is sort of the best thing about books.

Books remind us that we don't really know anything. They keep us humble and reflective on just how big everything is and how we can never know it all. Every single book is going to have something in it you didn't know before OR didn't think of that way before. They are as individual as people.

Every person you meet knows something you don't know or has a perspective you don't have. That's the real contribution of literature is that sense of place in the universe and wonder at all there really is to know.

Thank you.

I doubt I'll ever read quite that many books in one year again. Partly because the remaining unread books are chonkers.. lol

Oh well, it was neat to do once. I do hope I hit around 100 this year so I can buy 50 books. But, we'll see.

Quite a bit of juvenile fiction and poetry books as well as short story collections. A lot of those are lighter on page count than a regular adult fiction book.

It was around 654 total books, but, probably around 300 regular books.

I run into them rarely. I don't have that many yet because I've sort of been making myself find them in person. At some point I may just cave and buy them online.

I haven't read all of mine either, some of them the bindings are pretty weak where I feel like even a single read through will be the end of them.

Lol, are you also a hoarder of the Grosset Dunlap famous dog/ horse stories?

Around 2200 books, rough estimate, mostly juvenile fiction, vintage picture books, vintage dog/horse books.

I worked in the youth/teen sections of a public library for years and most of my collection is from then when I used to do readers advisory and add a lot of my own books to the library collection.

I went back to school and quit library work and now I'm sort of at an impasse with my collection.

I still very much love juvenile fiction. Like, my spouse bought me Elephant and Piggie books for Christmas because I adore a good picture book.

My kid is 12 now and was never into kids books- she was reading teen fiction years ago.

Eh the yellowed originally white vinyl floors, the flickering fluorescent with every third bulb dead. The smocks. The dismal feeling of a retailer on the way out.

I do use the library a lot. But, I'm in a rural area and there is so much that just isn't available.

I didn't think it was that surprising.

Barnes and Nobles always had the best atmosphere of the big chains. Borders felt like a Kmart, no surprise when they closed. Books A Million had that Kmart feel too back in the day, but, they ripped a page out of BN's book and now look like Barnes on the inside.

People aren't just there for the books, they are there for an experience. Barnes and Noble got it in a way the other chains didn't.

If it feels like you are shopping in a Kmart, why not just shop online?

I go to Barnes and now Books a Million for the fun of walking through a predictable bookstore experience. I'm more likely to frequent my local bookstore, but, sometimes those big corporate places can be fun.

I have a multistep process.

If the book is really old where the ebook is free, I just read the ebook.

If the book is newer than that, I check the library first. If not available at the library and not available as a cheap ebook, then I buy the book.

Used books vary a lot in price. If the used book is only a couple dollar savings over the new book, I just buy the new book.

I'm 40 and own a few thousand books. Those are just the ones the library didn't have that weren't available free or cheap.

Now, I do make some exceptions for absolute favorites. So, books I'm likely to reread or pick up occasionally I go ahead and buy a copy.

But, yeah, if you read a lot you can quickly own way too many books if you buy them all.

My reading resolution is simple, I'm allowed to only buy half of what I read.. lol

If I want to buy a book, I have to read two.

2022 I bought 30 more books than I read and I already had a decent back log. I don't mind having a pile of unread books, but, I also don't want it to grow to the point where it is daunting. Every few years I go ahead and have a year where I can only buy 1 for every 2 I read. Usually they end up being big reading years. The last time I did this, I read the equivalent of 300 regular fiction books.

I don't think I'll read quite that much this time, but, I'd like to reduce how many unread books sit on my shelves waiting for me.

I occasionally watch videos about books. It's entertainment. Other times, I read professional journals about books, because I don't currently work in the field, that is also just entertainment.

In the end, you can't take it with you.

For most of us, it doesn't really matter how you interact with the book. If you get more out of it, good for you, but it matters little.

Unless your literary critiques are getting published or something, your thoughts and comprehension matter to nobody but you.

Critical thinking is just 'the objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgment.'

Most fiction doesn't really require it.

Other way around for me, lots of nonfiction as a teen and young adult, now 75% or so fiction.

It might work well to do lots, especially if you have some by the same author or similar genre. That kind of thing often sells faster than individual books. When I want to start a series, the first thing I do is go to Ebay and see if someone has the whole set or most of a set for sale.

I would do lots for anything that makes sense to do like that.

If you have signed or first editions, I would list them individually and just make yours the lowest priced. If the cheapest one is $15.99, make yours $14.99. You will still come out further ahead than selling at a local book store. Just be sure you are adequately estimating shipping.

If you want to sell faster and are willing to take more of a loss, take some photos of the whole collection and post a whole collection price on Facebook marketplace or something similar for local pickup. You might do alright. Local sales have always been mixed for me, but, I've done alright on larger lots. It has to be worth the effort to drive and meet someone.

Eh, read the award shortlisted books, Pulitzer, Booker, National Book and so on. A lot of those have slower pacing.

Google sheets spreadsheet.

Anything rated 3 or above I read the negative reviews and generally it's political bias that is the source of the negative reviews, particularly 1 star reviews.

Below 3 it is generally bad, but yeah, 3.5 can be decent just divisive.

There were parts of it that were great. I can't help but feel I would have loved an abbreviated version without all the archaic whaling terms and wildly inaccurate whale facts.

Yup, there are a pile of horse and dog books that are so intense for me to revisit I can barely believe they are mediocre.

We have a lot of crossover. I have to assume you've read Wuthering Heights right? It's been years since I read it, but I mentally group it with Jane Eyre.