How I Read

I ended up not doing many of the Month of Faves prompts in December because honestly the month is just too busy with the holidays and the girls' birthdays. But this topic - How I Read - definitely got me excited!!

I decided to break this down into a few sub-topics:
1) How I get my books 
2) Where and When I read
3) What I read

How I Get My Books

I am mostly an e-reader and I mostly check out my books from 3 different libraries. I remember when the Kindle was first released I was really skeptical about using an e-reader, but it was largely due to having to buy books. I have been a library reader for years and didn't like the thought of having to start buying books even if I liked the idea of an e-reader {I'll explain more in #2 why I love an e-reader}. When I found out you could BORROW e-books, I was super excited to try.

Brent bought me a Kindle for Christmas one year and the process to borrow books used to be really annoying - I had to check out the book on my laptop, download a file, and then plug my Kindle into my laptop to download the file onto the Kindle. It was worth it since the books were FREE, but things have definitely improved vastly since those early days.

Now I have the Kindle app on my phone, which I LOVE, and I would say 95% of the reading I do is on my phone. And guys, I have TERRIBLE vision {like worse than 20/400} and find it easy to read there, so the size doesn't bother me at all.

Here's the deets on how I have 3 library accounts {grin} - 

First, I have a library membership through our local library which gives me access to a shared Central Texas Digital Library. Honestly this digital library is pretty crummy. They don't have as wide a selection as other libraries, and they don't often have many copies of a book which results in long wait times. Trent also really loves listening to audio books and their kid audio book selection is downright abysmal. These books are borrowed through the Overdrive app.

Next, a friend from high school {hi Kathryn!} lives in Louisiana and lets me log into her library account and check out books. Her library uses the Cloud Library app, and I've found the selection is often very different from my CTDL books. Sometimes a book that has a large wait time via my library {Crazy Rich Asians is a good example} is readily available through hers which is awesome. But I also find that sometimes books that seem like a no-brainer to have aren't even in their system.

Third, because I have a valid state of TX drivers license {let's not talk about if I actually know where that DL is...ha}, I can get a library account to the Houston Public Library's e-library. I just found this out last week and IMMEDIATELY got online and created an account. Because the Houston library is so big, I was excited/hopeful for what books I'd have access to and especially the audio book selection for Trent. Trent was actually the first person to download something, and we were right - the audio book selection is great! This is also done through the OverDrive app.

Here's a recent example of a search I did and the results:
The book: The Tattooist of Auschwitz
Central Texas: #47 on 4 copies
Houston: #187 on 3 copies
Cloud Library: Immediately available
So needless to say, it's very nice to have access to multiple libraries, ha.

Every once in a while I will buy a book through Amazon for my Kindle when I really want to read it and can't find it via any library or when I loved it so much that I know I want to own it, Cancel the Wedding.

I read probably 2-3 'real' books/year as well - either when the only way I can find it via a library is our physical library, I get it as a gift, or I buy it at Half-Price Books. Trent LOVES HPB, and I can't go into a bookstore and leave without something!

Where and When I Read

Here's the beauty of an e-reader - I read ANYWHERE. Because I read on my phone, I always have access to my book. I don't have to remember to grab my book to bring with me to a doctor's appointment. Anytime I find myself sitting somewhere with 5 unexpected minutes to kill, you can bet I whip out my phone and open my book.

The place I read the most is in bed at the end of the day. This is probably the biggest reason I don't like 'real' books - I like to get in bed with the lights turned off, my fans going, burrowed down under the covers reading away. I often times end up reading for hours, ha. This is impossible to do with a real book!

What I Read

Anyone who has read my blog can probably answer this, ha. I largely read fiction with it heavily being weighted towards: chick lit, historical fiction, YA, and romance, ha. I dabble in non-fiction. And I think everyone knows I have a soft spot in my heart for the WWI/WWII 'girl on the homefront' stories. {grin}

What about you? Where/what/how do you read?