It’s a braw, bright, sunny day today.

I’m sitting back in the cabin, in between dealing with my son splitting his lip open and driving daughters around town, and deciding what to talk about today.

And on a day like today, with sun streaming in the window, my mind naturally turns to…

…reading.

But before we dive in, I’m going to do something I’ve never done before.

And because I never do it, I hope you’ll pay attention.

I’m going to recommend a newsletter about reading.

The reason I never do that, is that I hate “reading” content creators near as much as most “writing” content creators. Most of them barely read, they read shallow hustle-books, and their lists of “ten books you’ve never heard of that will change your life” are full of books that everyone has heard of and have changed nobody’s lives.

I hate the whole genre. Just go read a book instead.

And yet, there’s one guy I subscribe to who is different.

Matt Karamazov from The Reading Life actually reads. He’s been reading deeply, taking comprehensive notes since 2014. And the reason I subscribe is that he surfaces a lot of books that are good.

This ain’t the usual stuff (though there’s some of that) but some really interesting and fascinating books. Unlike every other creator, when Matt writes a list of “10 Excellent Books That Most People Have Never Heard Of”, I scan down it to find that I have heard of only ONE of the ten book, and it was indeed mind-blowingly excellent.

So I highly recommend you subscribe and treat it as a regular encouragement to read more interesting books. While Matt does offer breakdowns and book notes, I use his newsletter more as a survey of interesting books to add to my list.

(I’m a big believer in reading the whole book and then reading book notes and summaries to refresh your memory.)

So without further ado, subscribe below:

And now on with the meat of this issue which is that you should

Stop Reading This Newsletter!

(In five minutes when you’re done…)

Now, a lot of this will draw on the Write Way Course email on the same topic, because that course is going to be replaced soon by a much shorter and more focused one, so I want to start weaving the material into the main newsletter for posterity.

But I’ve re-written it from the ground up as I talk about in Craftsman Content Class as yet another worked examples of the principles of lesson six.

And it’s an important refresher.

Because if you are a writer and you don’t want to read?

You, dear reader, are NGMI.

It's like…

…an athlete that refuses to train
…a chef that refuses to read recipes
…a wannabe chess grandmaster who refuses to learn openings

It's step one, dear readers.

You have GOT to be reading. And reading a lot. And reading a lot of what people online don’t read enough of.

Non-fiction (mostly) doesn't count.

Self-improvement and business books definitely don't count. They have a place, and some of Matt’s recommendations above will transform your business, but they’re equivalent to courses - practical instruction.

They' don’t count for building your writing skill.

For that?

You need fiction.

All the great books of Western civilization? Fiction.

All the great writers still spoken about hundreds of years later? Fiction.

Dickens, Austen, Hemingway, Tolkien, Homer? Fiction.

So why this curious obsession with non-fiction self-help hack books that ignores 99% of the great books? That’s fine if you want to make listicles on X-Twitter, but if you want to be a great writer, should you read books about the great writers? Or books by the great writers?

The answer to that is

“Books by them, duh!”

And if you want to close this newsletter right now and go read my book then please do that. It’ll only take you five minutes after all.

But if you want to find great writing to apply the tricks we talked about last week in WWN63 : 18th Century Genius teaches writing trick three ways?

Fiction is where to focus.

Unlike most non-fiction, and I’m not talking deep theology and philosophy here, but the drivel that passes for book recommendations on social media, fiction speaks to the soul!

Human beings are not just mental and physical beings. We have a metaphysical soul.

(If that offends you the unsubscribe button is down the bottom.)

Just telling people facts is worthless. You have to hit them in the heart, the emotions, the soul, the body, everywhere.

You have to engage the whole person.

Fiction does that.

There's a reason every self-help book is padded out with stories. They might be…

…poorly written and inadequate stories…

…but they are attempts at recreating the magic of fiction: A relatable and powerful story that moves you from the inside out.

Storytelling is the most powerful skill you can learn. And I won’t bang that drum more here but just point you to our series on Storytelling here:

WWN1: Why Storytelling? 

WWN2: What's the Story? 

WWN3: How Therefore Shall We Storytell? 

WWN4: Keepin' it real 

Let's assume you do want to read good books. At least two a week.

Well, in fiction a standard novel runs around 75,000 words. More if you want a modern epic fantasy tome, but… why?

Add a non-fiction book and we’re talking a total of 125,000, which makes just over 20,000 words a day if you take a day off.

The average reading speed is 260 WPM, say 250 for ease and that's 80 minutes a day. Barely over an hour.

Now, I read something like 600 WPM for a good story so I really have no excuse.

But if you want to be a writer and you won’t spend an hour a day reading, you are so not going to make it, dear reader. You should be reading constantly, which leads to an important caveat:

It's not actually the number of books you get through that matters, it's the time spent reading.

Don't rush. Read at your natural pace. Do NOT try and speed-read. I do it naturally, I've never done it any other way. I can read a 300 page novel in the time it takes a guru to skim a 40 page business book for tweet ideas. That is my natural pace. But trust me, it’s overrated and comes with its own problems.

Instead of trying to read faster, make more time for reading.

And the tips to do that are simple:

Start with less screen time. I try and turn off my phone or put it away when my kids go to bed, or after I’ve done my daily Low Stress Trading trades at 8pm my time.

This means I'm not constantly distracted, and I turn to a book instead. I also watch almost zero TV so I can read more. When I stick to this, I do nothing from 8-10pm but read. When I stick to it...

…which is NOT most of the time.

I don't want you thinking I'm preaching some perfect CAW-CAW bullshido, there are long stretches like right now when I don't do it. But when I do I'm happier.

The second tip is to put books everywhere.

Former copywriter turned one-man conservative NYT review of books Jim Clair repeatedly tells me I'm an alien for this. But I read multiple books at once. Like, 6 or more. I have a book in the car, in the bedroom, in the dining room, one I'm reading on my Kindle, books all over my cabin, one in my coat pocket etc.

I'm trying to make it a natural habit to pick up a book instead of my phone.

I know it's a bit weird, but I can read half a thriller while my daughter is napping in the car, leave it for 7 weeks, and then pick it up and finish it while I'm at a wedding in the middle of nowhere.

That might not work for you, but you can definitely make sure you always have your book to hand (even if it's only one).

And lastly, set up dedicated reading sessions. Schedule them in your calendar as a recurring event. This is part of your craft, so treat it like part of your craft.

Instead of watching a film to unwind on a Friday night, I grab a book. Especially when it's a thriller like one of Lee Child’s or James Patterson's (bloody awful prose, especially Patterson, but I'm trying to absorb the masterful storytelling that made them bestsellers) I know I'll get hooked so I'll set aside a solid 3 hour chunk and just sink into the story.

Phone in a different room (and switched off), everyone else in bed, at least one long stretch like that each week is ideal though I don't always manage it.

Look, if all this sounds impossible?

Pull up your phone, right now. Open up the built in screen time checker. On Android it's down as "digital wellbeing". Idk what it is in iPhone, find it. Now.

How much time did you spend on social media, news, games etc. last week? That's just on your phone, I assume you check it on your computer too.

Now add your TV time.

If Social media + News + TV + Games = less than 7h a week I'll let you off.

Read what you can and don't sweat it.

If not?

You have the time.

One hour reading a day, see how much you get read.

Then try and read a little more every week.

Fill those dead moments in the queue with a paragraph or two of good fiction. Let it sink in. When you feel the urge to check Twitter, pick up a book of poetry and read a poem instead. Even read some non-fiction and philosophy, for all I care. Just read.

Don't read with a goal to learn. Just read and enjoy. You can come back to the best bits to study them another time. You can make notes if it helps you. But you need to be drinking deep if you want to write well.

And no, non-fiction doesn't count. Not even this newsletter.

So go forth and read!

But before you go, every time I talk about reading on X-Twitter, people hassle me for book recommendations instead of just searching my page…

…so I’m pre-empting it with a list of a few to try.

Rather than give the same old fiction-dominant list this time, what I did was to copy down the 1,400 or so that Matt Karamazov has on his site, and then go through it and look for a selection that I would also thoroughly recommend.

(That doesn’t mean I don’t recommend the other books, I just ain’t read all the ones that he has.)

I’ve retained Matt’s numbering:

1. Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

4. The Brothers Karamazov, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

(No relation to Matt, at least I assume not…)

9. 1984, by George Orwell

23. Brave New World, by Sir Aldous Huxley

55. Turning Pro, by Steven Pressfield

56. The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg

57. The War of Art, by Steven Pressfield

188. Mindset, by Carol S. Dweck Ph.D.

201. The Black Swan, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

204. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury

249. Do the Work!, by Steven Pressfield

261. The Dip, by Seth Godin

279. Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy

340. Paradise Lost, by John Milton

373. How to Read a Book, by Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren

436. How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big, by Scott Adams

437. The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

516. Skin in the Game, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

561. On Writing, by Stephen King

567. Atomic Habits, by James Clear

(Regular readers may be surprised to see that last one, but I thoroughly recommend reading it once. Just don’t be like those idiots online that think it’s a top ten best book ever and read it again every year.)

612. Reading Like a Writer, by Francine Prose

616. The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction, by Alan Jacobs

653. The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway

664. How to Live on 24 Hours a Day, by Arnold Bennett

681. The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler

696. The Red Queen, by Matt Ridley

791. The Iliad, by Homer

792. The Odyssey, by Homer

828. Tiny Habits, by B.J. Fogg

861. Animal Farm, by George Orwell

865. The Psychology of Money, by Morgan Housel

889. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson

962. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain

975. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson

1,162. The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas

1,186. Neuromancer, by William Gibson

1,195. The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. Le Guin

1,209. No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs, by Dan S. Kennedy

(I haven’t read that one but I’ve taken the course and yes, it’s a challenging one. No BS indeed. Ben Settle recommends the original printing if you can get it.)

1,230. Be Useful, by Arnold Schwarzenegger

1,257. So Good They Call You a Fake, by Joshua Lisec

You can subscribe for more of his notes and recommendations here:

Meanwhile, may your pipesmoke wreathe your book collection in a pleasant aroma,

James Carran, Craftsman Writer

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