Tracking Your Reading the Old Fashioned Way

Pen and paper reading journals can be cherished parts of reader's lives

Hi readers,

Happy Thanksgiving week. I hope your week brings lots of fun, family, joy, and remembrance. Thanksgiving is traditionally the start of the Christmas season filled with shopping, parties, and family time; be sure to save some time to read. Stopping to relax and read for a few minutes each day can help relieve the stress of the holiday season. No matter how much you enjoy this season, there are plenty of things going on in our lives to give us more than enough stress; reading is a welcome respite from all of that. This week is a short work week for me; I’m off at noon tomorrow, and I don’t return to work until Monday next week. It will be a welcome few days off to catch up on some reading.

Reader’s interest in tracking what they read varies. Some readers enjoy reading but don’t care about tracking what they’ve read by any means for any reason. Other readers track what they read in some manner. Some record the books in a notebook or a reading journal of some type, and others may use an electronic method that allows for tracking and viewing statistics about their reading habits.

There are so many options available for reading journals and digital/electronic methods to track your reading; let’s talk about pen and paper reading journals today. Reading journals are so pretty and so helpful to track your reading; unfortunately, I’ve tried everything from a simple notebook to a fancy journal designed for tracking your reading, and after recording a few books, I’m no longer interested in doing it the old fashioned way. I know many readers who track their books in paper reading journals. I am so envious when I hear they have done this most of their reading life and have all of this bookish information to reference for many years to come.

Here are two reading journals that I either own, have used, or believe in the concept of, even though I’m not capable of doing much more than just admiring them:

• My Reading Life: A Book Journal by Anne Bogel - Bogel, of all things Modern Mrs. Darcy, created this journal with book lovers in mind. It includes pages to record your reading habits, book lists by genre, season, and other categories, space to track your ever-changing TBR, a reading log to record up to one hundred books you’ve read, and blank pages to record quotes and other bookish stuff you want to remember. One of the unique things about this journal is its book rating system which allows you to rate the book on more than one criteria. This journal is beautiful, so pretty you almost don’t want to write in it, but if pen and paper are your things, you will love this. Here is another blogger’s review of this reading journal; there are a lot of pictures so you can see the different pages inside.

• Bibliophile Reader’s Journal by Jane Mount - You have probably seen this artist’s work before, but if not, here is a link to her website. Her illustrations are lovely, and she puts them on many different products. Her reader’s journal is another journal that I have admired from afar. I love her drawings and almost bought it for that alone, and I may still do so at some point. There is room to track the books you read, the date started and finished, along with areas to record your thoughts, quotes, and anything else you want to remember about the book. Mount also has two books that would pair well with this journal; Bibliophile: An Illustrated Miscellany and Bibliophile: Diverse Spines. Both books include a treasure trove of information about books, authors, bookstores, and contain many of her illustrations.

Here are links to a few other journals that I don’t know much about, but they do have good reviews and look like they would track your reading adequately. If you are hesitant to try out one of the more expensive reading journals, one of these might be a good starter journal to determine if this is something you would be interested in doing:

• My Book Journal: A 100-Book Reading Diary for Bibliophiles - From the online pictures, it has places to keep track of books read, book and quote lists, and it looks like it also comes with a reading challenge.

• Reading Journal: For Book Lovers - This is an older reading journal (2010) that has lists of recommended reading for every genre and award-winning novels. It has plenty of room to keep track of the books you’ve read.

• Reading Log: Reading Journal for 120 Books - This reading journal has four pages at the beginning to list the title of 120 books that you’ve read. There is a page number index linking to a review with your more detailed thoughts and rating. It is paperback and appears to be very basic, but for this price, it is a good journal to experiment with.

If your children see you journaling and want something of their own, here are a few of reading journals for kids:

• Reading Log for Kids - A cute paperback journal that tracks books read, start and finish dates, places to record what the child liked about the book, and what the child learned by reading the book. It looks like this journal is available in different covers to appeal to a child’s interests.

• Reading Journal for Kids - Another cute, inexpensive journal to try out if your child wants to journal what they read. Unfortunately, there are no pictures that I can find, but the few reviews are all good.

• My Very Own Book Journal - This is another cute paperback journal that allows the child to keep track of their reads and what they liked about the book. There is room for drawings and other things the child might want to remember about the book they enjoyed.

• Reading Journal for Children - This cute journal is described as an excellent starter journal for children that taps into their critical and creative thinking abilities. The journal will enable them to answer questions about the characters and setting, favorite parts of the book, and other prompts to help develop their creative thinking skills.

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I hope this has given you some good ideas about the different journals you can use to track your reading manually. Pen and paper reading journals allow you to decorate the pages to make them your own. If you choose a blank journal, the opportunities are endless. In an upcoming newsletter, I’ll tell you all about using a blank or dotted journal as your reading journal. The spreads are gorgeous, and I’ll show you plenty of examples. If I were more creative and had a lot of free time, this would be my preferred method of tracking my reading.

I track my reading electronically with Goodreads, and I have been relatively successfully sticking with it for the last few years. I’ve used spreadsheets created by others that keep track of the books I’ve read and provide me with a wide range of statistics about my reading life. I’ve set up a Storygraph account to use beginning in 2022, so I can compare GR and Storygraph. I also want to see what all the hype is about related to Storygraph. To keep the nerdy going, I’m putting together a listing of different types of reading challenges to help you expand your reading horizons. All this and more await you in upcoming newsletters.

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Happy Thanksgiving; may your day and week be filled with everything you enjoy, along with a book or two that will take you away from the stress for a little while. It’s these little escapes that bring peace and relaxation in this hectic world we live in. Happy Reading!

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Some of the links in this newsletter may be affiliate links. That means that if you click through and purchase anything, I may earn a small commission. This costs you nothing and helps me feed my voracious reading habit, and for that, I thank you.