Making big reading goals a reality

Laura Vanderkam [00:00:00] I will say, you can start a project at any point. I mean, people are so like, well, if I started it January 1st and then it didn't work out, I have to wait until the next January 1st to start-- which is not true at all. You can restart on January 21st. You can start on March 30th. Whatever you want to do, you're still reading something in a year or in six months or whatever you want to give yourself.

Anne Bogel [00:00:21] Hey, readers, I'm Anne Bogel and this is What Should I Read Next. Welcome to the show that's dedicated to answering the question that plagues every reader - what should I read next? We don't get bosy on this show. What we will do here is give you the information you need to choose your next read. Readers, we've shared a ton of great gift options here at What Should I Read Next this season? Everything from our two gift recommendation episodes to our 2022 Modern Mrs. Darcy gift guide and so many posts in between. But maybe the best gift for your loved one is the gift of reading together. This season, give your favorite reader a membership to the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club. Choose from three, six or 12 month gift memberships and your loved one will enjoy bookish community with fellow readers, monthly events like author talks and read alongs and endless book talk in our active conversation forums. This is a great place to spend some time with others who love a good book. Purchase a gift membership for your favorite reader or tell someone who's buying you a gift this year to check it out at Modernmrsdarcy.com/shop.

[00:01:29] Look, we all know how great it is to serendipitously stumble into the perfect read, but a great reading life doesn't just happen. With the new year just around the corner, many of you are thinking about your goals or plans when it comes to reading. You're thinking about what you want to make happen in your reading life. And you are going to love today's conversation because that is what we are talking about. I'm so pleased to welcome time management and productivity expert and my friend Laura Vanderkam back on the show today. Laura lives outside Philadelphia with her husband and five kids. She hosts the Before Breakfast Podcast and co-host Best of Both Worlds. She runs and plays piano and sings soprano in her church choir. Laura, I love that detail. Not only is she a dedicated reader, she's the author of book you know, and that we've talked about on the show, like 168 Hours and I Know How She Does It. Her newest book, Tranquility By Tuesday: Nine Ways to Calm the Chaos and Make Time for What Matters, came out this fall. And I liked it so much that after I read an early copy, I wrote an endorsement for it- even though nobody asked me to. We all know that nobody relishes writing endorsements, so that is really saying something. Laura last joined me on the show in episode 112, Your Best Reading Year Yet. And today we're back to talk about tackling big reading projects and actually enjoying them along the way, embracing the limitations of reading time and what that means for the titles we pick, and bringing more joy and ease into our reading lives while still enjoying a meaningful reading experience. Let's get to it. Laura, welcome to the show.

Laura Vanderkam [00:02:53] Thank you so much for having me back. I'm delighted to be here.

Anne Bogel [00:02:56] It's a pleasure. I did not realize when we talked about you coming on-- because you and I talk all the time. We're in a writing group, we touch base, and I really enjoy that. But episode 112 was almost five years ago. Your podcast was brand new. This was several books and at least one child ago. A lot has changed.

Laura Vanderkam [00:03:14] A lot has changed. But, yeah, that was a great episode. I know we talked about how to make more time to read, how people could fit reading into their busy lives. And I'm always amazed at how many books people do manage to read. And I know we all want to find time for more. So it was a fun conversation.

Anne Bogel [00:03:31] Yes, we do. It was fun to relisten to that episode, which I just did. And readers, it holds up and we talk about important things like realizing if you're the kind of person who's going to read every day no matter what, or if you only read if you have a really great book you're looking forward to. And we talk about how there's no right or wrong answer and just recognizing what kind of person you are and adapting accordingly. Also, we talked about your bucket list books in that episode and it was so fun to hear about the books. I remember you saying you wanted to read and I know at this point in your life that you have now read them. And I hear myself say things like, oh, I've been meaning to read The Count of Monte Cristo. And now I know I did that. I did that last year. And I followed your advice a little bit to do it just bite sized pieces. It's fine, you'll get through. But Laura, something I really love about your work is that you have this whole attitude that something is better than nothing. And, you know, hope. And I feel like in the reading life denial is often a strategy. Or I won't think about all the books I can't read before I die, so I'll just pretend it doesn't exist. Or I don't want to think about all the hours I can't spend reading, so maybe I'll just go watch some Netflix. And, look, we love Netflix, but that is not a strategy that is going to help you read more books. And I think you have such an interesting perspective because, first of all, you're a very linear, analytical thinker, which is very different than my approach reader. So I always appreciate your insights into their reading life, but also because of what you do. You talk to so many people about how they actually make the things they want to happen, happen in their lives. And you also get to hear about all the ways that we get in our own ways when it comes to those same things. Let's start by talking about your new book. So In Tranquility by Tuesday, you have these nine rules for bringing more calm and joy into your days. There things you do every week. You've been talking about your Tranquility by Tuesday. Did you say scorecard? Is that what you called it?

Laura Vanderkam [00:05:27] Yeah, I would give myself a scorecard every week how I did on the nine rules. And some weeks are better than others. You said something is better than nothing. Progress over perfection. But generally I do find that if I follow the rules, the week tends to go better.

Anne Bogel [00:05:42] These rules are so interesting. And readers, I highly recommend you check out the book because these rules are applicable to the reading life-- I think many of them-- but also the rest of your life. So you can get things under control so you have time to read. The rules like give yourself a bedtime three times a week as a habit. The one that I think about the most because it was the one that was the most poignant to me, was one big adventure and one little adventure every week. And readers may not have heard all these rules yet, but I'm so curious to hear. In the feedback you've heard from people who participated in your study to write the book and from people who have read the book, now that it's out in the world, what is the role that you are finding has most surprised people, has most helped them make positive change in their life?

Laura Vanderkam [00:06:24] Well, I definitely think that the adventure one because it doesn't sound like a time management rule. People are like, well, time management; you're going to teach me how to have shorter meetings or how to clean out my inbox, or how to make time to read and things like that. And so the idea of adding new things into your life, and particularly things that are about making life more memorable, doesn't necessarily seem like it might fit within the genre. But the idea is that much of adult life is the exact same day to day. We get up, we get everyone ready, we get off to school or work, we do whatever we have to do, collect everyone at the end, go through the march of dinner and bath and bedtime and TV, and maybe reading for your listeners. But these are all things that happen day after day, and there is nothing wrong with routine because it makes good choices automatic. But when too much sameness stacks up, then whole years sort of disappear into these memories sinkholes. Like, where did the time even go? I have no idea. And this idea of having two adventures a week is about combating that sense that time is blending into itself. So each week you do one big adventure, something that takes 3 to 4 hours, think half a weekend day, one little adventure, which can be less than an hour doable on a lunch break, doable on a weekday evening, just as long as it is something out of the ordinary. And I find that this rhythm strikes a good balance between having cool, memorable things in our lives. But it isn't going to exhaust or bankrupt anyone or upset the good habits that we already have. And I think a lot of people have really taken to this idea. They're like, well, it sounds doable. I want to make my life more interesting. I feel like life is boring. How do I do that? Well, here is a very practical way to give yourself something to talk about.

Anne Bogel [00:08:07] Yeah, it's so interesting hearing you say that. I think about all the conversations I've had with readers over the years. You're gathering data on how they use their time, and I'm gathering data constantly about how they engage with their reading lives. And I find over and over again that the books that readers love the most, the one they choose as favorites on the show, the ones they call lifetime favorite reads, are often the books that delight because they feel perfect for that reader, but also that surprise. So often readers start describing a favorite book by saying, "This isn't what I usually read," or "This isn't a book that I thought I would enjoy, but I took a chance on it. It was outside the ordinary." And I think that outside the ordinary is one reason that it was so memorable and so impactful for exactly that reason. It wasn't like the best of the stack of mysteries for a reader who loves mysteries. It was that book in the total opposite corner of the bookstore that they really loved that really stood out.

Laura Vanderkam [00:09:05] Yeah, we all need adventures in our lives. And whether that is literary adventures or actual happening adventures, it's just something that jars us out of the routine, out of the sort of mindlessness that can be how we experience day to day life. And so anything that can jolt you out of that is probably going to stick a little bit deeper.

Anne Bogel [00:09:26] Yeah. Now, something I really noticed with the adventures is that they do require planning. The planning isn't necessarily fun, but something that you have talked about in your work for maybe decades, plural now, is that it's worth putting in the effort. And, wow, does that have implications for their reading life! You talk about the difference between effortful fun and effortless fun. And I think those two categories apply so much to reading as well.

Laura Vanderkam [00:09:57] Yeah. I generally include reading as effortful fun. And this is rule number nine in Tranquility by Tuesday. The idea is that when a spot of leisure time appears, challenge yourself to do something that is effortful before effortless. Even the busiest people have some quantity of leisure time. The problem is that much of it is short in duration, or it's uncertain like how much will I have? When is it going to occur? Or it happens at low energy times like at night after your kids go to bed, after you've done your chores, that sort of thing. And screen time fits these constraints incredibly well, which is why even very busy people wind up spending quite a bit of time on Netflix, on social media. And, again, nothing wrong with that. As you said earlier, we love Netflix. The problem is, for many people, it winds up consuming the bulk of their leisure time because it is so effortless. Now, obviously, your listeners are making time to read already and probably in many of these longer chunks of time. But certainly we can read in the little ones too. I mean, one of the things that people who really get through a lot of books tend to be doing is using those small chunks of time that they have a book accessible. And so if they find themselves waiting for a phone call to start or waiting for the carpool to bring their kids back from soccer practice, the first thing that comes out is a book. And, yes, it may only be 2 minutes, it may only be a few pages, but those few pages add up. Most people have about at least 30 minutes of those chunks of time through the day. And if you think about adding 30 minutes a day to your reading life, many people can get through 20 pages in that amount of time. So if you are doing that seven days a week, that's another 140 pages. That's a book every two weeks that's added to your tally that you're getting through. And you're not sacrificing anything to make it happen. It was just using those little chunks of time that that were not being used before. Although, I suppose, generally I consider reading to be effortful fun, but probably for all of us there's some reading that is more effortful than others. And we probably don't want to do all effortless reading. I mean, probably better to do effortless reading than not read at all. But if you do want to do some effortful reading, you might think about how you could do that earlier in your day or earlier in your leisure time to make sure that you do it before you kind of go to the tried and true that you know is going to be an enjoyable experience.

Anne Bogel [00:12:20] That's so interesting. And, yes, you were reading my mind. We've been talking lately about how I've been helping my high school senior with her college essays. And, y'all, if you've not been through this process with your children of navigating college admissions, it is effortful and also can be a little bit draining. So I found myself at the end of a day, having finished a book that morning, needing to choose what to read next. And I was tired and my Kindle was all loaded with-- I'm reading titles for our Spring Book Preview and I'm just starting to peek at Summer Reading Guide titles while it's still fall and I have time. I'd really like to get some of these onto my I've already read this list. And what I had was this whole list of in-depth, meaty, serious, weighty literary fiction. And, Laura, I did not want to do it. I didn't know the story. You know, it's so much easier to be in the middle of a book. And it's easier for me to read a heavy novel when I am not dog tired and I just thought I don't want to. Then I remember that Abby Jimenez had a new romance novel out that was waiting for me. That felt effortless in that moment. Like, just sucks me right in. Easy, easy, easy. And so even though I sat down and I read for 90 minutes, that was easy. But I appreciate you pointing out doing the effortful early. So, in this case, reading early in the day could help. But I think that for me-- and readers, I'm so curious to hear what you think you can tell us in show notes-- often the effortful part isn't necessarily the reading we're already emersed in, but it's deciding what to read. And just strategically planning to tackle that decision when our brain is fresh can really help. This is something we've talked about on the show a lot recently as readers are dealing with just burnout from this time of year, but also the past few years and the accumulated effects.

Laura Vanderkam [00:14:18] Definitely. Planning helps everything, and I know we don't necessarily all like to plan our leisure time, but it's the idea of having a workable to-be-read list. If you know what you want to read next, it's easier to pull that book up if you have it available. It's easier to choose that over other things you might do with any spot of time. And planning is how we're going to tackle some of those bigger works. You want to read The Count of Monte Cristo. It's probably not going to occur to you to pull that up while you're waiting in line at the grocery store or something like that. You're going to need a plan to get through it, to keep yourself motivated through the whole thing. And so, I'm always trying to convince people to plan their leisure time and sometimes people feel like that is defeating the whole point. But I tend to think that we get more out of it when we've done that decision making process at a time when we feel like making decisions, or at least we've told ourself, this is the time I'm making decisions. And then as you're going about your daily life, you can just follow your marching orders. You don't have to use at least that part of your brain.

Anne Bogel [00:15:23] If you told me I was going to enjoy my leisure time 10 times more, which is a real possibility when it comes to scanning the list of weighty literary fiction, or like sinking into the new romance novel that I can't wait to read, I'd invest that time upfront. I just want to know that it's worth it, since the planning does not feel indulgent the same way reading a good book can. Laura, when you were talking about how those little moments add up and if you're just reading 20 minutes a day or 30 minutes a day, suddenly you're reading half a novel a week, that makes you a reader. That makes you a habitual reader. But something I've noticed consistently is that when it comes to the reading life, you are constantly doing the math. You are a huge advocate of not finishing books that don't feel like they're worth your reading time. And when I've seen you make this argument in print and with your voice on your show, it all comes down to the math. Would you tell us more about that?

Laura Vanderkam [00:16:18] Absolutely. It's about figuring out how many more books are you going to read in your life. And I think most of us don't really think about that.

Anne Bogel [00:16:28] No. What we were saying about hope and denial.

Laura Vanderkam [00:16:29] Hope and denial. It's like a limitless number. But it's actually not even as many books as will fit in a small library. If you live 50 more years (like we can all hope) and maybe you're younger listeners, that's quite possible, but many of us that would be pushing things a wee bit. And if you're going to read, let's say, 100 books a year, which again is a huge total for most people, that would be 5000 more books you would read in your life. I think for many readers, that is the maximum number that we are going to be aiming for. Many of us, it's going to be less. If you read 50 books a year and you live 50 more years, that's 2500 books. So, again, it's just not that many. And so the problem of having one of those books be a book you didn't want to read, well, there's two problems, really. I mean, one is that it's taking the place of some other book that you might have enjoyed far more if you have used the time to continue reading it. But the problem gets even worse than that because when we have a book that we're not really enjoying and not getting into, we tend not to choose reading as what we do in our leisure time. You're sort of resisting it a little like, oh, well, I could pick up that book or I could go to Netflix. I could do something else, anything else, really, because it's not feeling like you are enjoying it. And that means your tally of total books will be lower because you're not using that leisure time as reading time. So it's not just that it takes the place of one book that you could have enjoyed, it might take the place of two or three books that you might have enjoyed. And as we are only talking 2500 to 5000 books in our total lifetime, that is a pretty big cost. So I know many of us really like the idea of finishing things, but when you look at the opportunity cost that way, it can feel a little bit more stark.

Anne Bogel [00:18:24] Yeah. For me it's so much about opportunity cost, just like you're saying-- but not always. For a long time I thought if I started that book, I have entered into a contract and a "good reader" is going to finish that book because she started that book and that's how we do things in this world. But then I came to realize the time I spend on that book is time I can't spend on a book that is more, to me, deserving. So that means I shut it and tell myself I can come back to it later, but now is not the time.

Laura Vanderkam [00:18:57] Yeah. And as your listeners well know, we do like to finish things. And when it comes to taking on projects and habits, I'm actually usually very careful about saying whether I will do something or not precisely because I do want to finish it. I really hate canceling or quitting things. But that idea of being very careful what you take on can be helpful in terms of big projects or things at work or anything like that. It's a lot less helpful when it comes to your reading life because if you know you have to finish everything you start, you're not going to try books that are outside your comfort zone. You're not going to try that book that maybe could be good but maybe not be the one that could wind up being your favorite because you're going to have to march through the book one way or the other. So I think, yes, we like to go with stuff that we've started, we'd like to finish it, but the opportunity cost of not choosing a great book because you know you're going to have to finish it and won't be able to abandon it is high as well.

Anne Bogel [00:19:55] Yeah. And just to point out what else you could be missing with that approach, I talk to readers sometimes who say they only want to read five star books or they only want to read sure things. And the problem with that goes back to the big adventures and little adventures we were talking about and the surprise and delight. If you know what you are going to get then you can like it, but it's not going to be one of your lifetime favorite reads because it doesn't have that element of unexpectedness that really makes books memorable, that really puts them at the top, the tippy top of all the books you've read in your lifetime.

Laura Vanderkam [00:20:30] And maybe it would help to have that same mindset of one big adventure, one little adventure is about pacing. It's about putting in some adventures while still leaving our good routines intact. And so you might want to have something like that with the rhythm and the routines of reading books. So maybe you say for every nine books of my usual sort that I read, I'm going to read one that's out in left field. Maybe that's whatever the right rhythm feels like to you. But by having that sort of general rule for yourself, you can still enjoy your reading, make sure you're getting a lot of what you like and leave yourself open to possibility.

Anne Bogel [00:21:05] Yeah. Something that we've talked about a lot in our seasonal book previews and our Summer Reading Guide with our Patreon and Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club community, is we're always looking for those staples that avid readers love. Historical fiction, literary fiction, mystery, memoir. But we're always keeping an eye out for those wild cards that are difficult to categorize, that aren't the kind of books we usually talk about, or that I usually read because we need some wild cards in our life every once in a while. Keep things interesting.

Laura Vanderkam [00:21:35] We all need wild cards in our life. Very true.

Anne Bogel [00:21:39] Laura, when we talked five years ago, you had a growing list of bucket list books that you had ticked the box on. You talked about Kristin Lavransdatter and War and Peace and the Count of Monte Cristo. Wait, was that just mine or was that one of yours as well? .

Laura Vanderkam [00:21:57] That was just yours. I actually haven't read it yet.

Anne Bogel [00:21:58] Okay. Well that leads to my question, which I'm so curious to hear at this point. I know that you have some lofty ambitions for your reading life, and we'll talk about that more, but I'd love to hear what your current list of bucket list books looks like.

Laura Vanderkam [00:22:10] Well, this year I have been reading through all the works of Shakespeare. That was my big reading project for the year. So after having read War and Peace in 2017 and then talking to you for an early 2018 episode, I went and reread it during 2021. I read War and Peace at the pace of one chapter a day for the entire year, well up till December 27 because it turns out to have 361 chapters. But we're talking close. And then I started on my Shakespeare project for 2022. So every day I read about three pages in my gigantic Illustrated Shakespeare compilation, and I'm getting through it. We are recording this in late fall and I am about 5/6th of the way through and I have really been enjoying that. So that was something that was on my bucket list that will be almost crossed off this year.

Anne Bogel [00:22:59] I was shocked when you first told me about your Shakespeare project because reading all that--it was what-- 39? It's been a long time since I've been in college English.

Laura Vanderkam [00:23:08] I don't know exactly how many. And we included the shorter works. He has some long poems, the sonnets, the entire canon.

Anne Bogel [00:23:18] That sounds like a lot of words to me. That sounds incredibly ambitious. But when you said how many pages a day it was, I was flabbergasted because it was not that many Laura. So talk to me about doing the math for Shakespeare.

Laura Vanderkam [00:23:28] Yeah. Well, the basic math was that I have this book, which curiously my husband [Inaudible] he picked it up in Stratford on Avon when he was like traveling in college or something.

Anne Bogel [00:23:40] It sounds like a great souvenir.

Laura Vanderkam [00:23:41] Yeah, it's a souvenir that's been on our shelf for years. Anyway, it's 1024 pages. And so if you do the math, you divide 1024 by 365, you get about three. And the print is tiny. Like, it's not like reading three pages in a modern novel, which you could do in like 2 minutes. It does take like at least 10, usually more like 15 minutes to get through those three pages. But that's not much. Ten to 15 minutes every day for a year, you can get through the entire work of an incredibly prolific writer's entire life. It's quicker to read than it is to write. I guess even though he wrote quite quickly as well. But, yeah, it's been a great project and I guess that's the funny thing to think about it. If you could dedicate 15 minutes to this a day, you could read through all the works of Shakespeare in a year. I'll put that out there if anyone wants to take that on as a project. It's really not that big a deal. You can do it. I would recommend probably having some sort of guide or companion to it, but even just reading the Wikipedia articles on each play before you read it is probably going to be enough to help you know what you're encountering.

Anne Bogel [00:24:57] Because of what I do, I don't think I'm easily intimidated by a reading project; but I was so struck by how Shakespeare in a year sounded so daunting. But when you broke it down into those tiny pieces, it really wasn't. And it's not like that's your entire reading life the whole year.

Laura Vanderkam [00:25:13] No.

Anne Bogel [00:25:13] That might have been what I anticipated, but not at all. I'd love to hear more about your reading projects. It seems to me that that's a way that you've really been drawn to and found works for accomplishing these loftier reading goals.

Laura Vanderkam [00:25:27] I think it's a process that's good for accomplishing pretty much any goal. Any big goal can be broken down into small steps, and ideally the steps are small enough that you don't feel a whole lot of resistance to them. But if you are able to just keep going, it is the process of keeping going that allows you to make huge progress on anything. And so with Shakespeare, 15 minutes a day is not much. But doing 15 minutes a day for 365 days means you get through all of it. Same thing with War and Peace; any individual chapter only took 5 to 10 minutes to read. They're very, very short. But if you are setting out to read War and Peace, it looks daunting because there's like 1400, 1500 pages. You have hundreds of chapters. Oh, my goodness, how am I ever going to get through all of this? Well, if you have a long enough time frame, you can get through just about anything. And I've done projects along these lines with writing as well. You know, that if I can write 100 to 200 words a day on something, well then in the course of a year that's 36,500 words to 73,000 words, right? If that's 100 to 200 words a day. If you do it absolutely every single day, that's certainly a book length. If somebody was looking to write a book, writing 200 words a day would get you there. And 200 words is nothing. I mean, it's the amount of words that's in an email that you send about any random thing. Most people have probably written 200 words in emails by like 9:05 a.m.. So it's really not that much if you have a long enough time frame and you just keep going. Now the just keep going part, that may be harder. I do maintain again that if it is small enough, you don't feel a whole lot of resistance to it. Most people manage to brush their teeth every single day without a whole lot of resistance to it, complaining about it, feeling overwhelmed, like, oh my goodness, I'm going to have to be brushing my teeth every single day for the rest of my life. It's like, yeah, okay, tell me something else that doesn't sound so bad. So, hopefully, you can choose a reading project that's like that. And that's how you can get through some really big stuff.

Anne Bogel [00:27:40] Well, and whether you're talking about reading or writing, when you're doing it every day, you don't forget what just happened. You don't lose the plot. It's easy to literally pick up right where you left off.

Laura Vanderkam [00:27:52] Yeah. And you have to choose the right thing. So as I'm figuring out what my reading project is going to be for 2023, that has been the criteria. I mean, one that it is worth doing. Like it needs to be books or an author that is worth devoting that amount of time to over the course of a year that it has stood the test of time, but also that it would be doable, right? That in a couple minutes a day I could get through all of it. My current thought-- we'll see if I stick with this, people can check in with me, but I think of reading through all the works of Jane Austen because I haven't read all of them. And so that would be something that could take the year if I read it a very little bit each day, including the six novels and the Juvenilia or whatever you call it. That would be a project.

Anne Bogel [00:28:38] Laura, I haven't read them either.

Laura Vanderkam [00:28:41] Okay. Even [Inaudible] speaking to Modern Mrs Darcy.

Anne Bogel [00:28:45] I just haven't read the Juvenilia, I haven't read all of the juvenilia. I've read, I believe, everything else. But, yeah, I mean I could finish that by the end of January. Easy peasy.

Laura Vanderkam [00:28:56] Yeah. That's true.

Anne Bogel [00:28:57] But then again that wouldn't be much of a project.

Laura Vanderkam [00:28:59] Well, and so I want to leave space for other things too. I mean, this is just a project that helps me do some reading in the morning to get through some of these bucket list books. And I know that Jane Austen has her own inherent pleasures in these novels and so probably it's the kind of thing that could go quicker if I decided to do so. But Shakespeare was fun at times, too. I mean, there's some really long monologues that are less so, but there's some really funny parts as well. I think it's the kind of thing that could be done at a little bit of day and that would allow me to keep going through, even though some parts and maybe some of the novels have a little bit parts that might be harder to get through otherwise.

Anne Bogel [00:29:41] I'd love to hear some of your thought process. Like, do you recall any of the potential projects that you have at one point or another considered and then decided didn't feel right, didn't meet your standards, that you weren't quite as excited enough about to commit to?

Laura Vanderkam [00:29:56] I had to think about it to come up with Shakespeare, but I had been meaning to reread some of the plays that I hadn't read in a long time. I was thinking, oh, that's another thing I could put on my what should I read next list. And then I was like, well, I could do all of it. If I look at this, there's 1,024 pages in this book. Clearly I could get through it in a year and it meets the criteria of being something I haven't read-- most the plays. Well, now I have, but at the time I had not and it would be worth doing. I mean, clearly Shakespeare has stood the test of time. So that's how I chose that. I've thought about reading books like Count of Monte Cristo. The whole false accusation plot thing is just not my favorite. I've seen Les Mis. A lot of people say Les Mis would be a book that would be worth reading over the course of a year. I've seen the musical, I don't know, I haven't really liked what I've sort of dabbled in on Victor Hugo. I know it's great. I know there are people who have built their whole career studying it. There are people who love these sorts of things. It's the 5000 books phenomenon. You have to be careful of what you are choosing.

Anne Bogel [00:31:04] Well, Les Mis takes up six of them. And as someone who has read the unabridged Les Mis, I can't say I'm feeling inclined to talk you into it. And if the unjust accusation plot in the Count of Monte Cristo gets you, then the wildly out of scale punishments in Les Mis just feels a hair's breath away.

Laura Vanderkam [00:31:26] Yeah.

Anne Bogel [00:31:26] I'm curious to hear, as you hear from readers about the kinds of projects they've taken on and broken down into bite sized chunks, do you have any interesting ones to relay?

Laura Vanderkam [00:31:35] So a lot of people have told me that they've chosen the Bible and people might ask, well, why am I not doing that, like, why would I not read that? In part probably because I've read pretty much 90% of it. And so I could see reading through it again, but it wouldn't be necessarily approaching it for the first time, which is kind of the fun of doing some of these year long projects. A lot of people did that. Some people have done series of big works. They don't just choose one work to go through over the course of the year. They might say, well, I want to get through Count of Monte Cristo and like Les Mis and Moby-Dick and like one other or something. And maybe that's the way to go as well. If you truly think that it would be doable in more than three pages a day, then that suggests that you could do it. But the thing about reading project is you want to have some sort of theme to it. And so all the works of one author has a certain consistency to it that would be good or all books of a certain kind. But I do know that a lot of people did do War and Peace after I mentioned it. It's really convenient. What can I say? It's one of those books that if you say you've read, people forever will think you're a serious reader.

Anne Bogel [00:32:50] I still haven't read it.

Laura Vanderkam [00:32:52] I'm sure you'll get through it at some point.

Anne Bogel [00:32:54] I mean, maybe. It's going to take a slot or six on that list.

Laura Vanderkam [00:32:59] That's true. It might not be one of the 5000. And so, yeah, there it goes.

Anne Bogel [00:33:02] I'll just watch the movie. It's the same thing, right?

Laura Vanderkam [00:33:04] More or less.

Anne Bogel [00:33:05] I kid. I kid mostly. Laura, what would you consider your current bucket list books to be right now that you're still looking to experience for yourself?

Laura Vanderkam [00:33:15] Well, definitely the Jane Austen books are on the list.

Anne Bogel [00:33:18] Have you read any of them?

Laura Vanderkam [00:33:20] I have read most of Pride and Prejudice. I got to say, I got bogged down in the middle so I skipped over some parts before getting to the end. So I need to go back and rectify my error there. I've read a lot of Virginia Woolf, but not all of Virginia Woolf, so that's something that I'll probably get through. I'm vaguely tempted by Proust, but I know that is a long, big project, so I would have to get my head around whether that was worth doing. So those are the kind of writers I'm looking at. I have read a bunch of books that might theoretically make it onto a list like this. Like I read Ulysses. I read it twice. I actually kind of enjoyed it. I read Moby-Dick. I'll actually throw Moby-Dick out there as one that people might consider reading if you're looking for an old novel. Herman Melville is occasionally very wordy. You have to remember he's writing this before people had cable, before they had Netflix. This was their entertainment to fill time and so you're like getting this whole set piece on whale oil or whatever else is going on. But it's actually a really good read in many case. Like, much of the time I was like, what's going to happen next? And these characters are fascinating and I'm learning about whaling, so I would put that out there as a more accessible book than you might imagine.

Anne Bogel [00:34:34] I got to say, the bar is not particularly high on that one in my book. More accessible, it wouldn't take much.

Laura Vanderkam [00:34:41] Yeah, exactly.

Anne Bogel [00:34:44] Laura, as we're going into the New Year, I'm thinking about this as someone who's interested in a reading project and also who pivoted hard from her reading project last year. So in 2022, I wanted to become a completist for more of the authors whose works I know and love. And for example, one of those authors was Doris Kearns Goodwin. She's one of the best nonfiction writers writing today. I love her work. I don't typically read 1000 page history books. I'm more of a fiction and memoir reader, but every time I read her work, I'm so glad I spent time with her. And so I thought, I have four or five Doris Kearns Goodwin books I haven't read, I should read them all. And I quickly realized I don't always want to be in the middle of a Doris Kearns Goodwin book. I want more of a rhythm to my reading life, where I'm reading those occasionally, but not all the time because I would be reading all the time to finish those 4000 pages in a year. A four year-- one DKG a year does not sound as catchy as a one year reading project. So with that experience fresh in my mind, and having talked about the compulsion some of us feel to finish when we start, I'd like to hear you talk not only about choosing a project, but also pivoting if you recognize it's not quite working.

Laura Vanderkam [00:36:06] Well, you do want to choose something that you can stick with. And I will say you can start a project at any point. People are like, well, if I started it January 1st and then it didn't work out, I have to wait until the next January 1st to start, which is not true at all. I mean, you can restart on January 21. You can start on March 13th. I mean, whatever you want to do, you're still reading something in a year or in six months or whatever you want to give yourself. And I agree, there's something awesome about being a completist. And often people's catalog of work is amazing. Sometimes it turns out that you read some of their work and some of their other work is less awesome. I don't know, or at least less accessible. I'm having that feeling that that might happen with Virginia Woolf because I read some of the novels and loved them. To The Lighthouse is one of my favorite works of all time. And then I read The Waves and I'm like, oh, this is getting a little bit out there. And I think some of her work may have gone more in that vein as she was stretching the boundaries of what one did with the English language and being all artsy with that. And so part of me thinks that I don't want to take that on because I don't want my experience of To the Lighthouse to be diminished by reading stuff that I then really don't like and have to wade through. So, I think, put some serious thought into it. Ask yourself what you would be really happy to have read and if it's something that is doable in small enough chunks that you don't feel a huge amount of resistance to it. And so for many people, things like War and Peace or Shakespeare or the Bible are all books that we probably do say we want to have read in our lives. And if it is the case, then you may as well give it a shot. And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. I actually had a blog reader tell me that they had done a Bible in a year project and had abandoned it at like day 300. I mean, so she had gotten through almost the entire year, but she felt like it was such an obligation by the end that she wasn't feeling like that was how she wished to approach the Bible. And so she stopped the project so that she come back to it later. And I totally get that. I totally get that. So you you are free to quit at any point, even with a long term project. But if you are going to make it through a big work, this may be the way to do it. It's a way to make something big more accessible.

Anne Bogel [00:38:26] Yeah. And I just think that you're talking about Shakespeare and the Bible. I'm thinking about how when I finally read Middlemarch, which was a bucket list book for me, all of a sudden all these references in books I was already reading became visible to me and they just completely gone over my head before. So when we talk to readers who are thinking about biting off a big project that's oriented around the classics, sometimes for them to understand how this reading experience will continue to serve them well as they read contemporary fiction and nonfiction being published that references these works. But if you haven't read them or you don't understand the reference, it goes straight over your head. But knowing that the rest of your reading becomes richer because you persevered, that can be really galvanizing for a lot of readers.

Laura Vanderkam [00:39:07] It can be. I mean, I'm seeing this all the time with Shakespeare, who is quoted and referenced all the time and you don't even know it's him. And sometimes it's just random coincidences that I was reading one of the stories-- I forget which Henry it was-- but it says the game's afoot. That's the phrase that comes in there, the game's afoot, which is something that Sherlock Holmes it's in there all the time, too. And even feeding off of that, I was reading this book, This is Not a Book about Benedict Cumberbatch, which is a memoir of loving Benedict Cumberbatch's work. Of course, he played Sherlock Holmes in the Netflix series. And so she makes that offhand reference to the game's afoot. And I'm like, whoa, that's... You know, going through Sherlock, going back through one of the King Henry plays, it's just everything feeds on it and everything feeds on Bible references, too. And so when you do know that that's where it's coming from, it does open up all sorts of insights into literature that you wouldn't necessarily have otherwise.

Anne Bogel [00:40:08] Yeah. Laura, we are on the cusp of a new year, a new reading year. So even though you could start a project any time, there is something-- I was going to say magical about January 1st. There's nothing magical about January 1st, and yet it can feel like a fresh start for a lot of readers. So for those who are looking to bring more joy, more satisfaction, I think more confidence is a big thing for a lot of readers. They know they want to have a better reading life. They know what they want to feel a little more committed. They know they want a plan, but it just feels so big and squishy and they're not sure how. But Laura, you were the queen of breaking things down into bite sized pieces. Progress, not perfection. Something is better than nothing to start. I'm curious to hear your gut reaction to just a couple of things that pop into your mind for inspiration, encouragement moving forward.

Laura Vanderkam [00:40:58] Yeah. Well, I mean, there's nothing wrong with trying.

Anne Bogel [00:41:04] Wait, hang on, how often do we not believe that? It sounds so straightforward.

Laura Vanderkam [00:41:09] Nothing wrong with trying. I mean, it may not work, but it might and you won't find out unless you do try. So if there is a book that you have been wanting to read or want to have read, which is perfectly fine as well, you may as well try in 2023. And you're better off choosing a smaller number and actually getting through them than having a list of 200 huge books you want to read in 2023, which probably won't happen. And also, just be realistic about how much time you can devote to this and when you will want to devote to it. So I do my reading project reading in the morning. I mean, much of my reading of normal stuff occurs later in the day, like at night before I go to bed. But I don't have the wherewithal to approach Elizabethan English at 10:30 p.m. at night. I don't know what I'm reading at that point. And so that has to happen in the morning when my brain is a little bit more fresh, when I am sitting down in my office getting ready to start my workday. But think about how much time you could devote to it. And it doesn't have to be a lot. Maybe you can devote 10 to 15 minutes to it and think about what you could get done in that amount of time and what you think you would mostly enjoy doing. Then see if you can just stick with it. We want to keep with things long term, but take it day by day. So think about each day and say, well, when can I do it and am I going to do it today? And before you quit, you may as well say, well, can I just do today? I can always quit tomorrow. But if I could do today, that would be great. And then I can make a decision on whether to quit. And often you just need to get through that next day and then tomorrow it's not that big a deal to do another 10 minutes. And then the next day maybe it's not that big a deal to do another 10 minutes. Much of this these big project, these big books, are in many cases really good. Like they've stood the test of time because people do like to read them and they enjoy the stories. Tolstoy, for instance, still has amazing things to say about the human condition 100 years, 200 years after the events are taking place. Shakespeare has survived because people see in these plays human nature reflected, that we all love and hate and want revenge and we make mistakes. And as a result of mistakes, terrible things happen. Or hopefully make mistakes but still bring things back and have a good time afterwards anyway. So these are all things that people enjoy. And so often, if you can convince yourself to just do another day, you'll be happy that you did.

Anne Bogel [00:43:47] I love that. There's nothing wrong with trying. Laura, are there any other practices or strategies that you anticipate being essential to your reading life in the years to come?

Laura Vanderkam [00:43:59] Well, doing the effortful before effortless, I'm a big fan of e-books. Precisely for that reason, many people don't walk around with a book in their back pocket or in their purse. But most of us do have our phones with us constantly. And so if you have ebooks on your phone, it is just as easy to open an e-book as it is to open your email app or one of the social media apps. And so that can open up a lot of time as well. And so I'm always trying to get myself to do that. I vastly prefer reading on paper, but I have to be realistic. I'll read on paper at night before going to bed the book that's on my bedside table, but I won't do that through the day. I won't do that while I'm out and about in my life. And so I need to get over the fact that I prefer to read on paper and just go with the electronic versions if that makes it easier to read. One of the other Tranquility by Tuesday rules that might be helpful for people who are considering a big reading project is actually things don't have to be daily. So I know you and I have been spending much of this episode talking about how doing something every single day for a little bit can add up. And that is totally true. But if your life is such that you would prefer to do something a couple times a week, that can be a habit too. So maybe it's that you want to devote three 30 minute chunks of time to your reading project every single week. Well, that might actually be more doable for many people than doing 15 minutes every single day. I don't know. You know, your life looks as it looks and you know what would work best for you. But one of the Tranquility by Tuesday rules, rule number four is that three times a week is a habit. And I find that this is a much more accessible and doable way to think about habits because many of us can't do big things every single day. People are, like, I want to exercise, but I can't go to the gym every single day. It's like, well, who said you had to? Do it three times a week. That is a pretty regular exercise routine. You want to eat family meals, doing family meals three times a week. I think it can be part of your identity. We're a family that eats together regularly. You're playing the piano. You practice a piano three times a week. You are still going to make progress. You can be a piano player in three times a week. Maybe you want to do a reading project that involves reading something three times a week and that can be fine too, whatever you think you will stick with.

Anne Bogel [00:46:17] Laura, I love that and I love that the spirit behind these rules again is that they're meant to not be some standard to stick to because it's the standard, but they're meant to empower you to be satisfied with how you spend your time. And around here, that often means your reading time.

Laura Vanderkam [00:46:36] Yeah. Well that was the whole point of the Tranquility by Tuesday rules, is that I'm not going to tell somebody how to live their life. These are suggestions that I tried out on 150 people. I had them do them for nine weeks and people's lives got better. They were more satisfied with their time afterwards. And so if all these other people experienced greater joy and satisfaction in their life, maybe you will too. So think of them as as ideas that Laura is suggesting- if you don't like rules. But if you do like rules, then you're welcome to take them as rules and see how you're doing week to week. Again, progress, not perfection.

Anne Bogel [00:47:08] Laura, thanks so much for joining us today. I really enjoyed hearing how you bring your analytical eye and data-driven approach to this aspect of our lives where we tend to shy away from taking that view, but can really benefit from having some honest conversations and also some really practical strategies for getting more out of our reading lives.

Laura Vanderkam [00:47:28] Well, thank you so much for having me. I always hope that people can spend more time on what matters and less on what doesn't. I definitely think reading is one of those things that really does matter. So I'm always grateful to hear that people are finding more space for it in their lives.

Anne Bogel [00:47:40] We think so too. Thanks so much.

Laura Vanderkam [00:47:42] Thanks for having me.

Anne Bogel [00:47:49] Hey readers, I hope you enjoyed my discussion with Laura and that our conversation today has given you inspiration and maybe even a plan for your own reading life. Find Laura on Instagram and Twitter at Lvanderkam and at her website lauravanderkam.com. Check out her podcasts Best of Both Worlds and Before Breakfast wherever you listen to What Should I Read Next.

[00:48:10] For links to all those things and to Laura's books, plus the full list of titles we talked about today, visit whatshouldIreadnextpodcasts.com/ 359 for all the show notes. Share Your Love or our podcast by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. We appreciate every kind word and your reviews truly help new listeners find our show. A five star rating and review is an excellent way to spread the book love. We'd love to show up in your inbox with our weekly email newsletter where I share book news and tell you what I am reading lately. Sign up at: whatshouldIreadnextpodcast.com/newsletter.

[00:48:44] Find us on Instagram for peeks behind the scenes, snapshots of book stacks and photos from my literary life. I'm at@Annebogel and the show is @whatshouldIreadnext. Make sure you're following in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Tune in next week when I'll be coaching my guest with 2023 Reading Prep to set her up for her family's feisty annual reading competition. Readers, that's it for this episode. Thanks so much for listening. And as Rainer Maria Rocha said, "Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading." Happy reading everyone.