Far too many good brains have been afflicted by the pointless enthusiasm for useless knowledge.

To be a great reader, it is not enough that you read, it’s also how you read. The following strategies by no means are a complete list, but if you implement even a couple of them,  you’ll not only be a better reader but a better person too.

Reading Right

If you find yourself wanting to speed up the reading process on a particular book, you might want to ask yourself: “Is this book any good?”You turn off a TV show or movie if it’s boring. You stop eating food that doesn’t taste good. You unfollow people when you realize their content is useless.Life is too short to read books you don’t enjoy reading. The thumb rule: 100 pages minus your age — so if you’re 30 years old and a book hasn’t captivated you by page 70, stop reading it.That way, as you age, you have to endure crappy books less and less.

Stop Reading Books You Aren’t Enjoying 

I cannot call somebody ‘hard-working’ knowing only that they read. I need to know what and how they read too.

From Seneca to Ronald Reagan, it has been a best practice to save or collect notes, ideas and quotes.Type out quotes and passages from great books to feel great writing come through you. Have a rough notepad, a collection of quotes, ideas, stories and facts that you want to keep for later. Or just use the Deepstash app! It will make you a much better writer and a wiser person.

Deepstash Before Deepstash

You were in high school when you read The Great Gatsby for the first time. You were just a kid when someone tell you the story of Odysseus.The point is: You got it, right? You’ve already read them or learned about them, so you’re done, right?We cannot be content to simply pick up a book once and judge it by that experience; it’s why we have to read and reread.

Read The Book Again Because You Have Changed Now

If a book changed someone’s life — whatever the topic or style — it’s probably worth the investment. If it changed them, then it will likely at least help you.Ralph Waldo Emerson’s once quoted: “If we encounter a man of rare intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.”

Ask For Book Recommendations

Humans have been fighting and dying and struggling and doing the same things for eons. To not avail yourself of their knowledge is arrogant and stupid.How dare you waste investors’ money by not reading and learning from the mistakes of other entrepreneurs? How dare you so take your marriage or your children for granted that you think you can afford to figure these out by doing the wrong things first?You must learn from the experiences of others. Drink deeply from history, philosophy, and more. Study the cautionary tales and the screw-ups, the failures and successes.

Don't Make The Same Mistakes Others Have Made

The path to wisdom is not a straight one. The journey is long and circuitous with twists and turns, ups and downs, highs and lows. Maybe you’re in the middle of a low right now, or you’re at the very bottom of the valley. This can be a scary place to be, because it can feel like you’ll be stuck there forever.It helps to revisit your favourite books and be energized again.

Reading As Therapy

Simple advice to help you get more out of the books you read, from author Ryan Holiday.

Stashed ideas

6 strategies that will make you a better reader — and person

Lots of people, especially young readers who are struggling to improve their reading skills, can benefit from the visual format of comic books and graphic novels. With their intense visuals and focus on plot and characters, comic books can be much more engaging than other literary media, such as novels or short stories.Comic books may also help people develop the reading skills required to comprehend texts with higher levels of difficulty. When people read comic books, they learn how to process information differently, as we'll explore in the following section.

#1: Comic Books Help People Learn to Love Reading

According to University of Windsor English professor Dale Jacobs (2007), comic books require readers to create meaning using "multiple modalities." Readers of comic books must process all the different components—visual, spatial, and textual—of what they are reading and integrate these components into one solid understanding of the story. This means that, even though comic books may appeal to readers for the same reason these individuals are drawn to other forms of entertainment, such as television and video games, reading these books actually involves much more complex processing.

#2: Comic Books Help Us Think Differently

No doubt you've been told that reading is good for you. Growing up, you were likely told that the more you read, the better a reader you would become. However, if you aren't interested in being a good reader in the first place, this really isn't much incentive to read more. Neuroscientific research by Berns indicates that reading stories actually has a noticeable effect on brain function. This study showed how reading a compelling novel changed participants' neuron activity not only while they were reading but also for several days after they finished the novel that was assigned to them.

#3: Stories May Be Good for Your Brain

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Batman. Wolverine. Green Lantern. Superman. The Incredible Hulk. Men in Black. Captain America. Unless you've been living under a rock, you've likely heard of all of these characters. You've probably even seen most of their movies. Because superheroes are cool. And where do superheroes originate from? Comic books. If you enjoy big superhero blockbusters, such as The Avengers or The Dark Knight, there's no reason you won't enjoy the stories from whence these adaptations came. There is a whole culture to explore surrounding comic books and their adaptations.

#4: Comic Books Are Cool

Okay, so maybe you're not into superheroes. That's fair. But did you know that you can read comic books and graphic novels about lots of other topics, too. There are also tons of great graphic novels and graphic nonfiction books out there, such as Alison Bechdel's autobiography, Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis; and many more. The visual nature of graphic novels allows you, as the reader, to experience these themes in different ways than you do when reading a traditional book. Don't limit yourself to regular prose; explore everything the world of comic books and graphic novels has to offer.

#5: Comic Books Are More than Just Superhero Stories

"Is reading comic book good or bad? "  It's a question that occurs to almost every comic reader or the once who wanna try this out ... So here are some reason to start it right away and enjoy the reading them..... 

It's a bird! It's a plane! No, it's a graphic novel! Whether or not you're a superhero fan, reading comics is a great way to spice up your life.

5 Reasons to Start Reading Comic Books

One of the benefits of reading is that you can master the best of what other people discovered. But it is only true if you can actually remember and apply the lessons and insights you read.

How to get the most out of your reading

You will instantly know if you picked up a good book. It is well written, packed with ideas and insights and is well organised. Naturally, you will want to read the next page. Good books finish themselves. Trying to finish a bad book is a grind. Instead, skim a lot of books and read a few. You don't need to finish a bad or mediocre book. When you realise you can quit a book without guilt, you create the space and opportunity for a great book.

Give up quickly

Reading the words on a page or screen is the easy part. The problem is that this is often the only way we learn to read. There are different approaches to reading. <ol><li>Reading to entertain. This is what we are taught in elementary school.</li><li>Reading to inform. You skim to get a feel for the book.</li><li>Reading to understand. You read to chew on things and digest them.</li><li>Reading to master. You read a variety of books and articles on the same topic, evaluating them and forming your own opinion.</li></ol> You don't need to read everything the same way. We spend most of our time in levels 2 and 3.

Levels of reading

If you want to improve what you get out of reading, you have to choose great books. There are only a few new books that might prove valuable, but most will be forgotten. So instead, let time filter the good books. Find the books that stood the test of time. Time is limited, so direct it to knowledge that lasts. Read old books. Read the best ones twice.

Choose great books

The best way to get more out of books is by taking notes with the blank sheet method. <ul><li>Before reading a book, write down what you know about the subject using a mind map.</li><li>When you finish a reading session, add to the map with a different colour.</li><li>Review the page before you start your next reading session.</li><li>When you're done reading, bind the sheets and review them periodically.</li></ul> When you use this method, you will literally see your knowledge grow as you add new information. You'll start to connect ideas across disciplines and develop your own ideas.

Taking notes - The blank sheet

Write in the margins of your book. You bought it. It's your property. <ul><li>At the end of each chapter, write a pointed summary of the main chapter. Then, try to connect it to something in your life, such as a memory or other idea.</li><li>When you're done with the book, pack it away for a week, then revisit it and go through all your notes.</li><li>Write the main idea of the book on the inside cover. You can also make a custom index on the back cover with themes or topics.</li></ul> The idea is to connect new knowledge to existing knowledge and find the gaps in your understanding.

Conventional notes

Reading more isn’t helpful if you can't retain and apply your new knowledge. This guide offers a system to help you read more deeply and remember what you read for years to come.

Reading Better - Farnam Street

Every book should be read no more slowly than it deserves, and no more quickly than you can read it with satisfaction and comprehension.

There are two types of inspectional reading: systematic skimming, also known as pre-reading or intelligent skimming, and superficial reading. 
The first type of inspectional reading is systematic skimming, which you can easily put into practice today.

Inspectional Reading

<ul>
<li>Read the cover and preface. </li>
<li>Read the table of contents, which will give you a feel for the map of the book.</li>
<li>Understand the language of the book. This means skimming the index. Not only will this give you an idea of the range of topics covered but it will also tell you the other people the book connects to and the jargon used in the book.</li>
<li>Identify the pivotal points. </li>
<li>Read the end. Authors generally do a good job summarizing their work in the last few pages. This is where they sum up what they think is most important about their work.</li>
<li>Listen to an interview or podcast of the author.</li>
</ul>

How To Systematically Skim A Book

﻿Skimming helps you reach a decision point: Does this book deserve more of my time and attention? Why?Unless you’re reading for entertainment, if you can’t answer that question, you can toss the book.Mastering intelligent skimming will:<ul><li>save you a lot of time because most books are not worth reading</li><li>offer knowledge of the book’s blueprint and contents so you know where to find stuff if you need it in the future</li><li>and improve retention, if you decide to read the book in its entirety because you’ve primed your brain with the contents.</li></ul>

Deciding To Read The Entire Book

This is used when you’re taking a book that’s notably above your level.
A superficial reading means that you quickly read from start to finish without stopping to ponder the things you don’t understand. The reason this works is that by reading the book from start to finish, you’ll have a great overview of what’s going on. You might only understand 25% of what’s going on but that’s better than nothing. Should you decide to go back and re-read the book, a lot of the things that gave you pause the first time would have been resolved.

Superficial Reading

Superficial reading is the first step towards analytical reading – that is, understanding and interpreting a book’s contents. If you stop and go over everything you don’t understand on your first reading, you get lost. Sure you finish the book but you’ve lost sight of where you’ve been and where you’ve come.
Inspectional reading should be able to answer the questions, what kind of book is it? what is it about? and what is the structure, or blueprint, of the book “whereby the author develops his conception or understanding of that general subject matter?”

Just Read It

There are millions of books out there. Most of them aren't worth your time. This article shows two powerful ways to get the gist of any book in under 60 minutes.

Consider if you are reading a novel, a play, an expository work. It may sound simple, but it is not. For example, is Gone with the Wind a romance or history of the south? Any book that consists mainly of opinions, theories or speculations conveys knowledge and is an expository work. It is also important to know in which way a book is instructive. For example, a book on physics does not deal with a problem the same way as a book on morals. The best way to do this is with inspectional reading.

Know what you are reading

Practical books tell you how to do something you want to do or should do, along with an argument for the right way of doing it. Theoretical books are concerned with something to be seen or understood. It teaches you that something is true.

Practical vs. theoretical books

Every book has a structure that should be understood. There is a difference between a pile of bricks and a single house. A book is like a single house. It is made up of different rooms, sizes, shapes, outlooks, uses. Each major part has an amount of independence. A good book, like a good house, have a great structure. <ul><li>Say what the whole book is about as briefly as possible.</li><li>Then, set forth the major parts of the book, show how they are organised into a whole.</li></ul>

Blueprints

The author may or may not tell you what the questions were that caused him to produce his work. It is your task as a reader to formulate the questions as accurately as you can. You should be able to state the main question the book tries to answer and be able to state the subordinate questions if the main question is complex with many parts.

Find out what the authors problems were

There are four levels to reading. This article deals with the third level: analytical reading.

The first rule of analytical reading is that you must know what kind of book you are reading.

6 strategies that will make you a better reader — and person

5 Reasons to Start Reading Comic Books

Reading Better - Farnam Street

Inspectional Reading

Analytical Reading

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