Informal poll... how many books do you read on a weekly/monthly basis and how many of those books do you review here?

I have been trying to figure out my own percentage and it was quite a surprise to me.

At least four nights a week, I read three to five books to my five-year-old. Let's cut that down the middle and say four (16 books). For school right now, I'm reading two trade books and one Shakespeare play each week, for an additional 3 books. On top of that, I usually find time to sneak in 2-3 books that I want to read. Let's call that 2 and add it all up to 21 books per week.

A quick perusal of my reviews show that in the past six months, I've reviewed: 5, 2, 3, 4, 2 and 5 books (21). There were roughly 26 weeks in those six months, meaning I read around 546 books. Assuming some to my son were repeats (though not many, we're avid library-goers), let's call it 500.

21/500 - I've only reviewed 4% of the books I've read in the past six months.

Wow. I really, really need to do better than that. I'm going to try and slowly up my percentage. For the next month, I'm going to shoot for 10%, then 20%, etc. up to 50.

I'm a slow reader and I don't post many reviews so my percentage is probably less than 4%. But my math is worse than my reading so I'll leave it at probably.

There are several reasons. Many of the books I read have already been reviewed, sometimes by several reviewers, and I don't have anything new to add. "Yes, they are right" is short, even for an Express Review.

Or it's a book that doesn't seem of general interest so I figure why bother. Or it's a graphic novel, which I read for the words, and I don't know what to say about the art. Or I mean to write the review and get distracted by other things, including other books to read.

Or the book isn't in the database and it's not worth trying to get it added. The system is badly flawed and the Category Leads have their hands full as it is. It would be different if Epinions were serious about wanting book reviews. Their soliciting floods of SH reviews and leaving the search engine a mess show they are not.

It's admirable that you want to increase your percentage. If everyone did by just one or two points, there would be many more recommendations on the site. And if everyone did them as well as you, there would be many more worthwhile recommendations here.

I'm a slow reader too. Even so, I'd guess I review only 80% of what I read. I've been spending more time lately reading short fiction, which I usually review on my blog.

That's stuff I read for myself. Like Stef I'll read dozens of kids books each week with my children. I've probably reviewed 1% of those, tops.

-Andy

I read about a book a day, depending on how much free time I have that day and how long/difficult the book itself is. I'm trying to introduce more adult literature and more non-fiction into my diet...I'm way too comfortable in YA/fantasy and need to break the mold! ([whine]But I love it.........[/whine]).

I also read/skim a number of books a week for school, usually relating to composers and scholarly musical topics. This probably is about 5 per week.

I review most of the books I read for pleasure, unless they already have a lot of TR reviews. The academic books are way too numerous and time-consuming to review, and I'd hate to inflict some of them on you guys! ;)

So I guess that skews my numbers, but as far as personal reading, yeah, 90% is a good number.

Victoria

P.S. I have no particular suck-up sentence but never object to giving Stef some well-deserved kudos! :D

Right now I certainly review fewer than 50% of the books I read. Maybe I get to 20% of them, maybe even less. When I lived in Belgium, English language books were in shorter supply, and there were far fewer demands on my time, so I reviewed most of the books I read then (not counting travel guidebooks). I'd guess it was at least 80%.

I also take into consideration the number, content, and quality of reviews on a book before I commit to writing my own. If there are a bunch of good reviews, I would have to hold a minority opinion on the book before I'd invest the time in my own review. I'll happily trash a book that everyone else loved, if I hated it, and vice versa.

I think the 10-4-10 has been bad for my book reviewing. Books take thought and time to review. It's been easier for me to crank out more reviews on more trivial items. I'm honestly hoping the promotion ends this month. There are several books and other products I'd like to find the time to review on a more in-depth basis than I feel I can right now.

But then, even if the promotion is over this month, garden season is nearly upon us. That'll eat up the free time.

I wondered this also.

At one point I was kind of disappointed in myself because I wasn't reviewing much of what I was reading and it just suddenly hit me: why not?

As of now I'd say I probably review about 50-60% of what I read. I read a lot children's books to my soon-to-be stepson and my nephew but they're often repeats.

The things that usually stop me have already been mentioned above, pretty much: sometimes many people have already reviewed it and I simply don't have anything to add to what they've said. Also some books I have such mixed feelings about I don't really know how to review them.

On a side note: eplovejoy, I read and review lots of graphic novels and sometimes describing the art escapes me... I just don't know what to say/how to say it in some books' cases. Don't worry so much about describing the art's appearance, per se, just describe the overall effect. What graphic novels do you mostly read?? I'm looking for new suggestions!

Laura

I try very hard to read a book a week. I don't always manage, but I try. I simply don't have a lot of free time, between work and home stuff. I review almost 100% of the books I read. The only way I wouldn't review it is if it's not in the database, and I'm too lazy to SAP it.

It's funny, sometimes I think I haven't much to say, but once I get started, I always manage to find stuff to say. It's only the books category for which this is true.

I read anywhere from 5-20 books a month, though I'm closer to the lower end lately since I've been reading some of my mom's textbooks she's no longer using for classes (what? She's a history major, I love those books! Alas, this is what happens when a brilliant mind is denied college :P) and read almost all non-fictions otherwise which are difficult to enjoy when the kid, dogs, significant other, TV, cat, frogs, whatever else is distracting me because I have difficulties retaining names and dates if I'm not paying good attention so they go much slower. I review every single book I read now, though I've only been doing that for almost a year.

I don't count my son's books into this total since he's still in board books, but I'd say I've reviewed about half of his books so far.

I review almost everything I read, with rare exceptions. Of course, many of my books are provided by review sites, so I kind of have to. :)

Dave

During one week, I probably review about 60% of adult/fiction/non-fiction that I read one tenth of the children's books. It's fully possible for me to review 20 to 30 kids books in a week if my percentage increased to 100%. Like Victoria I absolutely love well-written Y/A fantasy/adventure/social commentary books.

Patsy

I had to think about this one. I think I review a fair percentage (maybe even 50%) of the books I read that are written for adults, but a much lower percentage (maybe more like 10%) of the children's books I read. My daughter is at the stage where we read new books all the time, both longer read-alouds but also picture books and beginning readers. We seem to bring mountains of books home from the library! I like the idea of setting a goal for upping one's percentage of books reviewed. I may try that!

I read about two per month, and all get reviewed here, unless they cannot be added to the database. I just finished a very flawed, self-published book, and it is reviewed elsewhere.

Me, I review 100% of the KidBooks I read - about three a year - and perhaps 50% of the grownup stuff, fiction or non-fiction...

None of the last 9 in-print books I've read is in the database, though some were there before I started reading them, so my percentage of reviewed to read is zero. Given the range in publication dates and publisher size, it seems to me that the books database has entirely broken down. Can I be the only one experiencing such problems? (And yes, I have submitted SAPs, though I've given up on that, too.)

:)

Two to seven a week. I've reviewed two books (total). Half of the books I've reviewed (yeah, that would be one;) ) are now posted under the wrong topic though. Not my doing.

I watch more movies than that though and haven't been reviewing much of anything lately. Can't really see getting up to ten reviews in a given month with my internet connection status (borrowed--whether from the library or friends or family or whatever).

Ander

I read many more books than I review. My criteria for writing a review is having something to say about the book. I don't care if it's been reviewed before by 300 people or if no one on the planet has ever heard of the book before. If I read it and have something to say, I usually write a review. It may start with just a hook or (rarely) the perfect title popping into my head or there may be one passage or event that evokes a visceral response or some interesting comparison between that book and something else I've read or seen takes over my thought processes, but there has to be something to compel me to write.

I have only reviewed about 1/4 of the books I have read in recent months. I can't say there is any logic as to which ones I review and which ones I did not review. The last four I did review paid $0.00 IS in June (at least as of this moment) so there isn't much incentive to review anything. -Dave