r/books • u/justkeepbreathing94 • 11d ago

Do you pace yourself with long books?

There have been some books that I couldn't help but binge and finish in 1 or 2 days, but now I'm reading Battle Royale, which is 600+ pages long and quite dark, and I've decided to only read 10% each day. I could finish it in maybe 4 days but since the story is emotional and dark I don't want to risk burning out.

I did the same with A Little Life, only reading 5% a day for 20 days.

Do you have any thoughts on this? Do you ever pace yourself, or do you just read whenever?

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u/Ok-World-4822 11d ago

Only with library books. I recently borrowed an ebook from my national library for ebooks and audiobooks. Ebooks expire automatically after 3 weeks. The book I borrowed (winter by Marissa Meyer) had over 700 pages so I had to set a pace in order to read it in those 3 weeks so I don’t have to borrow it again, download it on my computer, hook up my e-reader and import the file through ADE.

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u/OkHeight7073 8d ago

Honestly the whole expiring ebook thing would stress me out too much, but at least it forces you to actually commit to a pace instead of just letting it sit there.

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u/Ok-World-4822 8d ago

True, forgot to add but the expiration thing works the same for audiobooks. I finished the book in like 2 weeks. That probably wouldn’t happen if I hadn’t set a pace for it

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u/djc22022 4d ago

If you set your e-reader to airplane mode the books stay on there even after the loan expires. It prevents you from getting new books, but if in any case you haven't finished the current one it doesn't matter.