reading multiple books

[MaryB23]

Just curious if anyone can read multiple books at the same time. I have never been able to do this. I can read multiple non-fiction books, but not multiple fiction books. I get the plots too confused! :)

[Ursula]

I do this quite a bit, now that I think about it. Currently, I'm reading a book by a Buddist monk (Peace is Every Step), a memoir (The Memory of All That), and I'm in the middle of a very long political article in Harper's Magazine.

The content of my reading is often a bit, hmmm, complex? That's not the word. High level? Well, whatever it is, sometimes I don't want to read the writings of a Buddist monk from cover to cover without reading a bit of this or that interspersed throughout the day.

[Lisa Jo]

Mary, I totally understand! I can have umpteen non-fiction books going, but not more than one piece of fiction. Part of the joy of reading fiction for me is totally immersing myself in the story, and I don't enjoy splitting myself between several stories at the same time.

I do always have a book (usually classic children's fiction) I read aloud to my son each night, but I easily separate that from my own fiction read. :)

[SusanH]

I'm the same way - I rarely read more than one fiction book at a time, but nonfiction takes me a while to read and I usually have a novel going at the same time. If I'm reading more than one novel (like now), it generally means that one of the novels is boring me and I'm forcing myself through it.