Book Lists

I went through a phase where I picked all my books off of lists. I found my lists in a variety of places but mostly authors and awards. Many authors mention or suggest lists of books if they write memoirs such as in Stephen King's On Writing. Others write books that are essentially collections of suggestions. Nancy Pearl is my favorite of these, I have four of her books in fact. However there are a lot of these books that simply exist to lead people to other books.

Then there are the awards. The nice thing about following awards and their shortlist finalists is that 1) the selections are usually reviewed by a small group of, theoretically, experts and 2) by following the awards currently they can expose me to new authors. So I followed or do follow:

• The Hugo
• The Nebula
• The Booker Prize (Now the Man Booker)
• The Pulitzer in Fiction
• The Nobel Prize for Literature
• Goodreads Choice Awards

As sizeable as that collection is, there are tons of the things. I could spend my life just reading award winners if I chose.

However, at some point, this method of finding books soured on me. I'm still not exactly sure why; most of the books I've found through these lists were excellent books. I think that finding them this way means that I have no outside connection to them and so no impetus to read them.

Looking back at my reading so far this year, most of those books (80%) were found one of two ways. 1) someone in my life suggested the book to me or 2) I found the book through reading another book either by continuing in a series or by looking into other books an author has penned.

This more organic method gives me a more external prod to read the books. When I read a book suggested by someone in my life, I get to follow up with them about the book which often yields more suggestions from that person. It's a nice way to find things to read.

I still read award winners, but they account for a much smaller percentage of my stack.