Welcome to an experiment to nudge you to read for pleasure, uninterrupted, for an hour (or a few more)...

Try it out by following these steps -
#1. Open the first three goodreads linked out below in separate tabs on a device of your choice.
#2. Switch off your internet.
#3. Read every word at your chosen pace. The slower, the better.

If you successfully manage to do so, you would have read non-stop for atleast sixty minutes. You would have encountered one non-reader and two readers making a strong case for reading more. You would want to read more...

In that case, switch on your internet and scroll further down this post for five bonus recommendations for a few more hours of reading for pleasure.

Happy reading :)

[WANT TO READ MORE IN 2021?

ADD YOURSELF TO THE BIBLIOTHERAPY READERS' LIST]

NUMBER ONE [MANDATORY READING]

"If you're reading this sentence, you've read more than the (former) president has today." ~ Windsor Mann, The Week (May 21st, 2020) [866 words]

Trump's lethal aversion to reading

The president's coronavirus response illustrates the perils of bibliophobia

theweek.com

NUMBER two [MANDATORY READING]

"I am going to be talking to you about reading. I’m going to tell you that libraries are important. I’m going to suggest that reading fiction, that reading for pleasure, is one of the most important things one can do." ~ Neil Gaiman, The Reading Agency Lecture 2013 | The Guardian [3600 words]

Neil Gaiman: Why our future depends on libraries, reading and daydreaming

A lecture explaining why using our imaginations, and providing for others to use theirs, is an obligation for all citizens

theguardian.com

NUMBER three [MANDATORY READING]

"Growing up in urban India in the late '50s and '60s meant growing up with books. Television did not exist in the Bombay of my boyhood, and Nintendo was not even a gleam in an inventor's eye... I read copiously, rapidly and indiscriminately." ~ Shashi Tharoor, The Washington Post (December 1st, 1991) [2200 words]

A CHILD'S READING IN INDIA

washingtonpost.com

Congratulations! At this point, you would have read for about an hour!! To keep on reading for pleasure, take your pick from the five goodreads below...

NUMBER four

"Reading has been shown to put our brains into a pleasurable trance-like state, similar to meditation, and it brings the same health benefits of deep relaxation and inner calm." ~ Ceridwen Dovey, The New Yorker (June 9th, 2015) [Estimated reading time ~ 30-40 minutes]

The article which introduced me to Bibliotherapy (and bibliotherapists such as Ella Berthoud) last year...

Can Reading Make You Happier?

After the First World War, traumatized soldiers were often prescribed a course of reading.

newyorker.com

NUMBER five

"Forget squeezing millions from a few megahits at the top of the charts. The future of entertainment is in the millions of niche markets at the shallow end of the bitstream." ~ Chris Anderson, Wired (October 1st, 2004) [Estimated reading time ~40-45 minutes]

A 17-year old prescient look at today...

The Long Tail

Forget squeezing millions from a few megahits at the top of the charts. The future of entertainment is in the millions of niche markets at the shallow end of the bitstream.

wired.com

NUMBER six

"Perhaps you don't believe this. Perhaps you think such things don't happen in real life. Well, nobody says they do. Real life is one thing, and fairy-tale life is another. Anything can happen in fairy-tales." ~ Nikolai Nosov (1954)

A delightful Soviet-era illustrated classic fairytale for kids of all ages, digitized and restored after decades of oblivion post the collapse of USSR...

The Bibliophile's Bedtime Stories: Dunno's Adventures #1 - The Mites of Flower Town

Once upon a time, in a town in fairyland, lived some people called the Mites. They were called the Mites because they were very tiny. The biggest of them was no bigger than a pine cone.

bibliotherapy.scrollstack.com

NUMBER seven

The greatest book in the galaxy!!! Read the first fifteen chapters as a Kindle preview below...

The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Complete Trilogy in Five Parts (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Book 6)

Shared via Kindle. Description: A phenomenon across all formats, this 42nd anniversary paperback omnibus contains the complete Hitchhiker's Guide trilogy in five parts, charting the whole of Arthur Dent's odyssey through space and time. Share and enjoy. Col...

read.amazon.in

NUMBER eight

The tale of my journey as a reader over three decades, told through nine montages, nine quotes...

One Billion Seconds... plus a few million more...

Bibliotherapy (noun) - ‘The use of books to aid people in solving the issues that they may be facing at a particular time.’ First coined during the trying times of World War I.

bibliotherapy.scrollstack.com

Hope this was useful towards nudging you to read more. These guys agree... :)

Name. One book/author/topic on your reading list for 2021. Email. Phone number (optional). That’s all.
Sign up below to READ MORE this year and beyond... :)

Bibliotherapy Readers' List

Want to READ MORE in 2021? Add yourself to the Bibliotherapy Readers' List for exclusive nudges, guided reading meditations and more...

bit.ly

More guided reading meditation sessions online (and offline) coming soon!! Cheers!!! Till then, share this exercise with someone using the handy buttons below :)