Please don’t take me for a book nerd or something in the same vein. Given the grand scheme of things: I don’t read that much, I don’t take reading that seriously, and it most certainly doesn’t take up most of my time. For context, the hours (and dollars) I’ve spent playing video games is a few times higher.

My book-reading habit started in the middle of the pandemic in 2020. Since then, I’ve used Goodreads to keep track of my books, including the reading progress, highlights and reviews. When I checked my Goodreads today, I realized I have finished 92 books during that time. I also have 13 other books that I have started but have not yet reached the end (1). So, by technicality, I have now “read” 100 books. I think now is a good time to look back and reflect.

I actually started reading very young. I remember having read Dế mèn phiêu lưu ký (The adventures of a cricket) by Grade 1, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by Grade 2, and a plethora of comics (chief among them Doraemon and Conan the Detective) by end of primary school. But it was one of those habits that I did not carry throughout my adolescence, but then picked up again during adulthood (e.g., chess and badminton). So generally, I considered 2020 the actual starting point for my reading. The books I read before 2020 - including all the Harry Potter and the Sherlock Holmes - didn’t count towards this 100.

The start

Let’s start with why I began. By 2020 there were already lots of people online (and my friends as well) vowing for the benefits of reading (one I could remember was Ali Abdaal), which I did not buy into at first. It was not until the we were on lockdown and my lifestyle came crashing down that I intentionally looked to pick up new hobbies. Programming was one, reading was the other.

My initial expectations were modest. I did not expect reading to radically change my life (as some youtubers would usually put it), I merely was looking for something better to replace my poor daily doings at the time (mainly video games, social media, youtube and slacking off in classes). I did not even considering reading a very attractive activity, and I needed lots of external motivation that to pick and and sit through a book – which I actually got from this video.

Maybe it was a blessing that I set my expectations so low. I didn’t really force myself to read popular books that people were raving about at the time (Homo Sapiens, The World is Flat, How to Win Friends etc. - even though I had copies of these in the house). With the benefit of hindsights, I know that it was important that I got started and got going instead of getting bogged down by uninteresting (to me) books. Instead, I just picked up whichever books I found easy to read, which at first consisted of two detective stories (The Mysterious Affair at Styles [featuring Hercule Poirot], and Red Dragon [featuring Hannibal Lecter]). It was not until the end of 2020 that I regularly read the type of non-fiction books that I typically read these days.

What I read

I don’t really have a hard rule or some predefined preference on what I should or would like to read. As explained above, the flexibility allowed to explore a lot more and made the process as easy as possible, which was crucial.

Even to this day, my main way of finding new books is still via recommendations of other people, mostly online comments saying “A is a good book”, or via Goodreads’ and Amazon’s recommendations “B and C are similar to books you have read”. Once I get the name and the premise, I would go to Goodreads to check the main argument (for non-fictions), and more importantly, the reviews (mostly to see if there was any major, game-breaking criticism that would render the book unenjoyable), and then download a Kindle sample. If after all that I determine that the book is worth reading, I’d wishlist it on Amazon and wait for it to drop in price. My threshold nowadays is $5 (any book in the wishlist cheaper than $5, I’d buy it immediately). Occasionally I’d buy a book without discount if I read the sample and think it’s very very good (but usually my bills don’t exceed $15).

All of which is to say, it is difficult to succinctly describe what I like to read. That said, looking back at my bookshelf there are certain types of books that I gravitate towards.

For example, I read non-fiction much more than fiction (I don’t have an exact number but I’d say the ratio is about 4:1 or 5:1). Most of my books are written this century (especially the non-fiction), and most of which are from the 2010s – so I usually read things that are up-to-date and modern. I rarely read self-help (some definitely borderline on self-help even though they don’t market themselves as that, such as Ryan Holiday and Simon Sinek’s work), even though I occasionally find some to be very effective and not preachy, such as Atomic Habits and Make Time. I also tend to read more business-, soft-skill-, abstract topics-related books rather than technical ones.

My absolute favorites are:

• biographical works on real people/events – these are where I found the most inspirations (Steve Jobs, Moneyball, Shoe Dog, etc. – you can already see I idolize a very specific type of personality – and A Promised Land)
• the type of casual scientific books that bring lots of research about a singular topic together into one accessible form (Thinking Fast and Slow, Algorithms to Live by, Range, Why We Sleep etc.) – these are the ones I got most of the practical knowledge from
• and some macro-level analysis books (Chip War, Good Economics for Hard Times, Homo Deus, etc.)

Judging books

I am a bit of a critic, and I’ve done my fair share of giving scores to movies and games and such. For those medium, I’d often rate them based on their objective quality. But for books it’s a bit different. I think of books in terms of both their influence on myself, and their quality.

For example, Range and Homo Deus are both books that are influential in shaping my thoughts, but I don’t like how they’re written for the most parts, so you’d see me giving them a 4/5. Whereas, most of my other favorites are both well written and offer insightful conversations or thought-provoking discussions or novel, surprising, and useful ideas, that’s why I love them so much and give a 5/5. On the end of the spectrum, Effortless is a book that is both poorly written and repeats the same mostly nonsense (at least to me), so I’d give that book a very low 2/5.

Reading habits

As I said, reading books didn’t come naturally to me so I struggled massively at the start (and still do now). I needed some very good and strong habits to reach even 10 books, much less 100.

The first important I made was about the medium – which is to say I switched from reading on paper (and very occasionally, phones and laptops), to a Kindle. It made reading a whole lot easier (which, if I haven’t stressed this enough, is very important) due to the light weight and the perfectly crips e-ink screen, not to mention making buying books easier and cheaper as well (2). It totally changed my relationship with reading from something difficult and slow to start to something easy and frictionless. Although, I would say that getting a Kindle (which itself is expensive) isn’t a prerequisite to reading more – it very much is a personal choice; and I did much testing (including reading the first few books on paperback and on the iPad) before committing myself to its purchase.

The second, I think, was setting a fixed time for reading. In my undergrad years and later in my job, I would often set aside a fixed 30-minute interval dedicated to reading during which absolutely no other thing would interrupt me (including and especially phone notifications). This period often took place in the early morning (usually around 7am) before I went to school/work, a.k.a the time where my brain functions at its best. Additionally, I sometimes would read before bed, although much more rarely.

As for tricks to read faster or retain more details, I don’t actually use any (although, you - dear reader - may attempt to use them yourself). I skim and scan as a second nature (3). I did not start taking notes until very recently (and even so, only sparingly and at random) – although I admit that taking detailed notes has its benefits.

Reading slums

I must be very explicit in saying that I don’t keep up my habits all throughout 5 years. There were periods where I would read fast and incessantly (e.g., I read 8 books in Oct 2023 alone), and there were also many periods where I didn’t read much at all (e.g., I finished only 1 book in the previous 12 months).

Of course, there were many reasons for such fluctuations. At the end of the day, I knew I had to somehow get over them. Usually, I’d just go back to my old habits (say, read 30 minutes in the morning), but something I needed a bigger nudge (like, getting a more portable e-reader to use alongside the Kindle). Admittedly, it wasn’t easy.

Impacts

I’d say reading books as an activity in and off itself has some immediate effects (meaning the number of books I read doesn’t really matter). For example, in the periods where I read regularly, I find myself much more composed during and outside the reading (I talk slower and am less likely to get angry). I am also more likely to have much longer chain of thoughts and can produce much longer, more in-depth monologues (such as this and other recent blog posts). Another underrated impacts is that I have something to substitute for mindless doomscrolling, which alone is a huge boost to my mental well-being.

Of course, there are certain perks with reading many many (good) books. I happen to have conversional-level knowledge in some unexpected topics: I can debate with someone on the nature of creativity, I know that developing into a generalist has certain benefits over being a specialist, or ways that non-conformists find success despite defying conventional wisdom, etc etc. I believe this sort of benefits is provided most effectively by books because they have the time and space to dive into the nitty gritty and they force the readers to be proactive in thinking about their issues, as opposed to hearing about these from, say, Youtube videos where the process is much more passive and hasty.

(4)

Onwards

Of course reading a century of books is something that I’d consider impressive, but it isn’t necessarily a tangible goal or something. You don’t, say, ascend to a godly level of knowledge after passing this threshold. It’s just a small milestone that I took advantage of to milk out a discussion on reading. As I say, the actually number mostly doesn’t matter. What matters is what I read and how that is helpful to me. Overall, I’d say reading is totally worth the time I’ve given to it and I’ll be looking forward to the next 1 2 300 or however books many I can afford to buy.

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(1) In my defense, some of those books are VERY long, 500+ pages.

(2) For context, paperback English books in Vietnam are both hard to find and expensive.

(3) The consequence of doing reading comprehension exercises non-stop during my high-school years.

(4) As for the other typical benefits of reading, I’d spare you the details. You can easily find them on any online article.