My whole life, I’ve been a book monogamist–that is, I only read one book at a time. Sure, during school I had my classwork reading and my personal reading, so I was juggling multiple books at once. But I don’t count that, because my personal reading was still only one book at a time. Pick it up, read until I was done, start something else.
I’ll admit it–for a long time, I thought that’s how everyone read. I thought that was the only way to read. Why would you want to start another book when you haven’t finished the first one?
Well, now I have a Kindle, and I don’t take it to work with me. Buuuut I do want to read on my lunch break. So now I’m a book bigamist (not that I’ve ever actually heard anyone use that term, but it’s the logical next step) reading two books at once–the Kindle book when I’m at home, and a physical copy of something on my breaks.
It’s weird, and I’m not sure I like it.
Let me tell you why this is happening. For Beat the Backlist this year, I decided to wrap up a bunch of unfinished series, including the Outlander books. I read the first one in 2015 and the second and third last year. So here I am, wallowing through the 1000+ pages of Drums of Autumn, and I realized two things: 1) I might not have it done before Friday, which would leave me without any reviews to post; and 2) I needed something to read at work.
So I’m all about catching up on my stockpiled romances in February, and I did not lack for choice. I grabbed one and oops! finished it in just over a day instead of spacing it out over several, reading it at work AND at home until I was done.
So yesterday, I needed a different non-Outlander book to take to work with me. Which I’m strongly considering DNFing.
I’m apparently bad at book bigamy, because if I pick up a second book, I want to finish it before going back to the first.
My question to any readers who regularly juggle books: why is this your style? Different books for different moods, or something else? I’m confused, because this is not how my brain is trained to read, but curious about it.
elena johansen 
I honestly don’t know how people read only one book at a time. I usually have two or more that I’m reading. A book must really grab me for me to not cheat on it and that usually means I’ll finish it in one sitting.
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Interesting. If I’m not into the book I’m reading enough to want to cheat on it with another, then I usually take that for a sign I don’t really want to be reading the first book at all, for whatever reason. I’m more liberal about DNFing books than I used to be (it helps that I have over 300 unread books right now, thank you free Kindle romances.)
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I cheat even on the books I really like. I guess my attention span is just very limited. For example, I can rarely finish an entire trilogy in row – I just need to experience something else in between even if I enjoy the story and the world and characters.
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I get it. I read a new-to-me trilogy back to back in January, and by the end I was wishing I had taken a break in between at least the second and third book.
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Yeah, it really takes away from the enjoyment of the last book.
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I’m glad I’m not the only serial-reader here …currently I have three books-in-progress in the house, one in the car (for when I’m waiting for your father to get out of work) and one in my work purse for those days when I get a break. Most of the time I will finish the ones I start, but sometimes I go back to them and find I’m not interested any more.
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I could never compete with how many books you manage to juggle at once. Never!
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