How many books have you read?

[aquadump]

Would anyone be interested in a book club thread?
My thought is that we could have an ERE-themed book of the month with any inspired discussion, resources, and links in a forum thread.

[AlexOliver]

@rePete: That'd be interesting. Go for it.

[Pip]

Like the idea of the book club thread.
Thanks for the thought on book reader guys will mull things over.

[fiby41]

I used to collect the library cards with the names of the books I've read in the previous years but one I did not have paper left for the paper collage during arts and crafts class so used these instead.

The library class used to come one a week but we'd run through an interesting book quicker than that so about 50 a year since as long as I can remember.

Easily over a thousand.

[Lemur]

We've some impressive readers on this forum. I didn't read much at all past high school (and only read in high school when it was mandatory or part of a book report) until I found ERE and found inspiration here. I'm a slow reader and I have an ever growing list. Though I'd estimate I've read around 150 books now covering a wide range of topics.

[candide]

This thread confused me until I saw the 15 year jump. Time has shown that, no, people are not in practice interested in a book club here.

At this point in (the end of) history, video games are much more important, and at least we are starting to acknowledge that.

[jacob]

Time has shown that, no, people are not in practice interested in a book club here.

Some years ago the forum had regular "book clubs" where people would read the same book and discuss it. You can dig up the old threads. As with anything, it requires that rare person who takes the initiative to start something and such persons are not always around. Personally, I've never liked group work, so it ain't gonna be me.

[candide]

I do enjoy looking at the forum as a historical document (a really fun thread I uncovered at one point was 3D printing as new phenomenon and seeing a time when @sclass wasn't even sure about the viability of the technology). I appreciate and note that in the 15 years book clubs have existed.

I think the times have changed, and it is much harder to do in 2025, and will be even that much harder in 2030.

==

Oh, and I'll answer the question, I guess. Hundreds. Probably over a thousand. At the time, I thought I also had the advantage of quality. Infinite Jest (twice), War and Peace, Moby Dick, Nietzsche, Camus, most of Shakespeare... My daughter is named after a Jane Austen novel. A systematic study of history. GEB (at least three times), and Hofstadler's other works. My wife reads more total books almost every year, but she did this by reading young adult fiction (English teacher and now a school librarian), one year I read a bunch of childrens' books to get over her total -- somewhere around 112 that year, I think. I now read almost entirely non-fiction. Over the last few years I've learned a lot about geology and computing from the ground up.

And you know what else could convince you it has read all of that shit? Any large language model. If someone reads now, it either needs to acquire skills specific enough to not be swamped by AI (and for how long will that last?) or they need to really enjoy what they are reading... and video games are more fun for most people.

And while Qanon was the conspiracy theory (system) for people who want to write but don't want to read, likewise people will still write stuff.