Reading – a plan for 2021

My younger self would be aghast at the need for a plan to include reading in my routine. Reading books has been as natural to me as breathing for as long as I can remember. However, various things have brought me to the point where there are some days when I don’t pick up a book at all and that is not a good thing. What interferes? Well nothing bad, just children and a job and crafting. Anyway, I read some articles towards the end of last year which advocate having a plan for reading, so here it is.

My plan is to begin the day well by reading a chapter of a book at breakfast. I’m picking out non-fiction to read but nothing too heavy. I already mentioned my first breakfast read and now I am onto Paula Gooder’s “Body”, which I am very much enjoying. She is very good at explaining complex ideas simply and helping me to see what the baggage is that I have brought with me into my theological thought.

The other half of my plan is for last thing at night. I always used to read loads before getting to sleep but the elimination of caffeine from my system meant that my hours of night time reading were severely curtailed. This is generally a good thing since I never used to be able to tell whether I would take one hour or four hours to get to sleep. Now I rarely stay awake longer than half an hour. So, my current half hour read is “The Golden Age of Murder”, which is a really well written (and laugh out loud funny in places) survey of detective fiction from the 1920s and 30s.

Next up on the list of things to read will be my other Christmas books, probably leading with English Pastoral by James Rebanks.

Alongside this, I’ve joined a new bookclub set up by some clergy colleagues which is going to be devoted solely to children’s literature. We are beginning with Little Women, which I have on the kindle so was a quick re-read. I have gone onto Good Wives as well because it just follows straight on.