I've been keeping a books read list since November 1, 1972. So my yearly tally goes from Nov. 1 to Oct. 31. For the past 5 or so years, I've been averaging 125-140 books a year. Plus magazines, trade pubs, newspapers and newsletters (dead tree and electronic), etcet etcet. I'm compulsive. I read to get into the day (I schedule a minimum of a half hour of reading before I get "up", dressed and off to work or whatever) and I read to get out of the day -- requiring at least a half hour's reading time before turning out the light and falling asleep. I keep a book in the car, and (at various times) have kept a book in my lunch bag. (Lately I've been reading the local paper on my lunch break.) I used to read a "bathtub book" while sipping a margarita in a bubble bath, but since I broke my arm three years ago, I'm more or less limited to showers and a shower is NOT conducive to reading a book (or sipping a margarita). But that gives me more post-wake-up and pre-getting dressed time to read.

This morning I finished Angela Thirkell's "Northbridge Rectory" and started Thomas Flanagan's "The Year of the French". Got a book of poetry going in the car. Oh, and Aldous Huxley's book of essays on religion, "Themes and Variations". But I'm frightfully behind on reading Vanity Fair magazine.

I've been making a concerted effort to read some of the books that have been on the "to read" pile (or cleverly shelved) for twenty or thirty years while other books hijack my attention.

Linn