How do you choose your next book?

[pickle]

i love to try new authors just like nollaig recommended bill hussey to me and i think the great beauty of a bookforum is that you can really expand your reading list. In general i read crime mixed in with horror. My present book is the lovers by john connolly which is crime but gothic in nature...the best of both worlds really!

 

The Lovers is excellent massive fan of this series and John Connolly, couldn't wait for it to come out in paperbacck so bought it last year in hardback copy. Have you read 'the Gates' yet..if not it was very different but very good

[Reid]

How I choose my next book often depends on the last one I've read.

 

A few years ago i started reading Time by Stephen Baxter, which is the first in his Manifold series. I loved it, and hungrily gobbled up the rest of the books in that series. Then i read some more of his work but i didn't like it so much.

 

After a while, i kind of dried up for his style of writing, and yearned for something light hearted, so I read the Jeeves and Wooster books by P.G.Wodehouse. A total change and a breath of fresh air after very hard sci-fi.

 

So now, i'm unsure what to read next. Buying on-line is much more affordable, but not handy if you're not sure what you want.

 

What I sometimes do is go into the bookshop, and pick up a random book and I read the first page. If i feel the need to turn the page, i'll buy it.

Sometimes it doesn't work out, but its a great way to introduce myself to new authors and genres.

[SueK]

If I've enjoyed a particular type of book then I too will want to go on and read some more in the same genre - until I get a bit tired of it and it becomes overkill. I then look for something completely different.

 

Can't get my mojo in gear at all at the moment. I've hardly read since New Year and I'm bogged down with work and knitting for mates:blush:

 

I want to get back to this

[arewenearlythere]

I tend choose books related to the phases I'm in; for example, I was on a real Eco-friendly kick last year and picked up Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. By the time I finish a book I'm in the mood for something else. I like to read books that linger in your mind and make you think...very hard to determine these kind of books!

 

Word of mouth is always a good thing though.

[MountainGirl]

While I'm reading a book, I usually still go to books stores or see books & stop to look, and I'll make a list in my phone of books that caught my eye or are must reads (at the time). Then when I'm done I'll go and look at those and many other books to make my decison, its usually a lengthy process at this point, but I have so much fun doing it!! O my, I feel like a dork

[Skírnir]

Depends on the mood entirely...

 

What I'm interested in at that exact time. If I have books from the library or ones that someone else borrowed me, I usually try to be done with them first.

 

I also try not to start two at a time - that way, they seldom both get finished. I lag behind on one until I've forgotten what I'd already read of it and then I may never finish it...

[Kidsmum]

I have a huge backlog of unread books as i buy them faster than i can read so sometimes i'll choose depending on my mood but sometimes it's because i've had a book so long i feel i ought to read it:blush:

[emelee]

I have no list in mind. I go by the one I feel like reading next while in that moment of choosing. This week I chose part 2 of the Millennium-triology (The girl who played with fire) because I just finsihed off The girl with the dragon tattoo. Felt like that was the natural thing to choose.

[lauraloves]

i have all the books on a shelf that are tbr so i just get the next one off the shelf

[iamnotreal]

I generally just stare at the bookshelf until a book stands out to me. It usually doesn't take too long to choose the next book; most of the time I've already got a few books going anyway.

[Janet]

This has never happened to me before, but today:

 

I put Romeo & Juliet by Dire Straits on this morning because I had an urge to listen to it.

 

 

A lovestruck romeo sing a streetsuss serenade

Laying everybody low with a lovesong that he made

Finds a convenient street light steps out of the shade

Says something like you and me babe how about it?

 

Juliet says hey it's romeo you nearly gimme a heart attack

He's underneath the window she's singing hey la my boyfriend's back

You shouldn't come around here singing up at people like that

Anyway what you gonna do about it?

 

Juliet the dice was loaded from the start

And I bet and you exploded into my heart

And I forget the movie song

When you gonna realise it was just that the time was wrong juliet?

 

Come up on different streets they both were streets of shame

Both dirty both mean yes and the dream was just the same

And I dreamed your dream for you and now your dream is real

How can you look at me as if I was just another one of your deals?

 

When you can fall for chains of silver you can fall for chains of gold

You can fall for pretty strangers and the promises they hold

You promised me everything you promised me thick and thin

Now you just say oh romeo yeah you know I used to have a scene with him

 

Juliet when we made love you used to cry

You said I love you like the stars above and I love you till I die

There's a place for us you know the movie song

When you gonna realise it was just that the time was wrong juliet?

 

I can't do the talk like they talk on the TV

And I can't do a love song like the way it's meant to be

I can't do everything but I'd do anything for you

I can't do anything except be in love you

 

And all I do is miss you and the way we used to be

And all I do is keep th beat and bad company

All I do is kiss you through the bars of a rhyme

Julie I'd do the stars with you any time

 

Juliet when we made love you used to cry

You said I love you like the stars above I'll love you till I die

And there's a place for us you know the movie song

When you gonna realise it was just that the time was wrong juliet?

 

A lovestruck romeo sings a streetsuss serenade

Laying everybody low with a lovesong that he made

finds a convenient streetlight steps out of the shade

Says something like you and me babe how about it?

 

 

 

The afternoon I went out with my daughter to the Bookbarn and she was playing music from her phone - she put on Taylor Swift's Love Story

 

 

We were both young when I first saw you

I close my eyes and the flash back start,

I'm standing there, on a balcony in summer air

See the lights, see the party, the ball gowns

See you make your way through the crowd and say hello.

Little did I know...

 

That you were Romeo, you were throwing pebbles

and my daddy said stay away from Juliet

And I was crying on the staircase, begging you please don't go

And I said

 

Romeo take me somewhere we can be alone

I'll be waiting, all there's left to do is run

You'll be the prince

And I'll be the princess

It's a love story

Baby just say, yes

 

So I sneak out to the garden to see you

We keep quiet cause we're dead if they knew

So close your eyes, escape this town for a little while

ooh... ooh..

Cause you were Romeo, I was a scarlet letter

And my daddy said stay away from Juliet

But you were everything to me,

I was begging you please don't go

And I said

 

Romeo take me somewhere we can be alone

I'll be waiting, all there's left to do is run

You'll be the prince

And I'll be the princess

It's a love story

Baby just say yes

Romeo save me

They're trying to tell me how to feel

This love is difficult, but it's real

Don't be afraid

we'll make it out of this mess

It's a love story baby just say yes

 

oh oh

 

I got tired of waiting

wondering if you were ever coming around

my faith in you is fading

when I met you on the outskirts of town, and I said

romeo save me I've been feeling so alone

I keep waiting of you but you never come

is this in my head I don't know what to think

he knelt to the ground and pulled out ring

and said mary me juliet

you'll never have to be alone

I love you and that's all I really know

I talk to your dad go pick out a white dress

it's a love story baby just say yes

oh oh

oh oh

cause we were both young when I first saw you

 

 

And then on the way home, Steve Wright played Thea Gilmore's You're on the Radio. I can't find the lyrics online but it contains the line...

Cue those Capulets and Montegues...

 

If that's not telling me to read Romeo and Juliet - which I have on my 'to read' pile - then I don't know what is!

[JudyB]

I have to work out what I'm in the mood to read - sometimes I might have a book lined up if it's one I've ordered from work.

[Pixie]

I am not answering this question as it will provide unequivocal proof of my insanity.

[Ms Squiggles]

My TBR pile is huge at the moment, as in 400+ books, so I do sometimes find it a little bit daunting when it comes to picking my next book. I do try and have an idea in my head of the next 3 or 4 books that I want to read next though, so a lot of the time it's just a case of narrowing it down to one. This isn't always as easy as it seems though! I have been known to spend about an hour looking through them all trying to decide on one!

[Vladd]

Other than browsing round a book store and picking one, a favourite way to spend time, I have a few piled up by the sofa and sometimes just have a lucky dip.

[Pixie]

I am not answering this question as it will provide unequivocal proof of my insanity.

Huh. Two years since I posted this, and my response would still be the same.

[yuukiono]

When I decide buying books, I read middle pages a little bit, and feel the good mood.

And, I always read postscripts.  

[bobblybear]

I used to just pick what I felt like at the time, but as a result a lot of books tended to linger around unread as I seemed to go for more recently purchased ones. Now I've decided to do a reading plan of 6 - 7 books at a time, and stick with it. I thought I would find it too restrictive, but it actually takes the stress out of trying to pick the next book (and yes, I do get stressed over it, silly as it sounds ).

[Athena]

I saw some videos on YouTube of people making a Book Jar (ie.

), which is a jar with the names of books in it (on pieces of paper). When you don't know what to read, you pull out a piece of paper and then read that book. For myself, I'm not sure if the random system will work (I normally pick books based on what I feel like) but I thought it was an interesting idea (and fun to make it). However it has one drawback, if you pick a book just because you want to read that book, you then have to go through the jar to find the one you picked to take it out.

 

So, I'm working on programming a simple program that will pick a book for me. I haven't decided yet whether it'll simply pick from all the TBR books or whether I want to specify a genre and then let the program pick from that genre, or whether I'll let it pick a genre first and then pick a book (or maybe a combination of all three!). I'm doing the programming structure first, later on I'll actually add my books to the program (right now it's just placeholders, ie. "Author 1 - Title 1" etc.). So far it's only got some basic things in it, I haven't thought out yet how to best program this based on my options above (well, picking from all TBR books is easy, that part is done other than me actually adding any books, it's based on a random number generator).

 

Anyway, I just thought it'd be a fun little project for me to do. I don't know if I'll be using it or even if I'll continue programming it (it will depend on my mood I guess). I thought I'd share the idea (not my idea, originally) with all of you here on the forum.

[Miss Mabel]

Athena, what an interesting idea. Both actually. But mostly your program.

 

I pick books to read according to my mood and according to which book I need to read for a forum and/or RL book club.

 

I have always put my books onto the shelves according to genre and not so much according to author, so that when I feel in the mood for a romance (for example) I know where to go to find such a book.