Co-reading a book is something I’ve done only a few times but often I really enjoy it. It’s a brilliant way to get instant conversation about specific parts of the story whilst reading – being able to chat to the other person about a story event when you’ve both only just read it can be really fun.
I decided to write this post as I’m co-reading a book at the moment. Me and my friend, Jaz, over at Travels In Fiction said a few months back that we wanted to read Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi together. We both aren’t big readers of fantasy books and figured that if we did it together it would be more fun and easier to get through. So far, I have to say I’m loving it! My friend Charlotte over at Wonderfully Bookish is also joining the two of us as she wants to kick the slump she’s currently in.
What I most wanted to write about is the ways people co-read. I’ve often done it differently whoever I’m doing it with. This time around, we decided to set ourselves a little weekly goal to achieve, like 50 pages (or around that number depending where a chapter finishes). This means we can change it each week – if we are busier then we can have it as a smaller goal. We are also currently reading other books at the same time so we don’t want to set a huge amount!
I have before done co-reading where we don’t set pages or limits but just read and update each other where we are – sometimes that can work well but I think it also can be difficult! I really like to talk about the story in depth with the other person when we co-read, chatting about events that have just happened in it and what we think of characters/moments etc. But if someone is way further ahead its harder because their opinion will have been altered by other bits of the story!
At the end of the day, it all depends on who you are reading with, what you want to do and how you want to do it. I’ve loved it so far with this, even though it’s only been two weeks and we are already behind! I love that we aren’t putting pressure on each other or ourselves to read it quickly and we are enjoying it at a steady pace and having lovely chats about it as we go. I’d like to co-read some more books next year – I especially love doing it with anthologies or collections as you can then set a specific story to read by a certain time and it’s simpler!
In terms of Children of Blood and Bone, I’m really loving it so far! It is so, so different to anything I have read recently which I think is what I needed to get back into reading. Though I’m not the biggest fantasy reader, there are some I really enjoy and I heard amazing things about COBAB so couldn’t wait to try it. I love that it has a map at the beginning, showing where all the places are within Orïsha – something that really helps me with fantasy is being able to see/visualise where things are or what things are and then it seems to make sense more in my head (if that makes sense…)
How do you feel about co-reading books?
The Little Contemporary Corner 