Curious Chase

Curiously Chase

A Pragmatic Approach To Choosing A Format For Reading

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If you're a voracious reader, it's worth creating a framework for choosing a format for reading books. Here's the framework I use, feel free to copy/pasta and change as much as you'd like!

Format Options

There are 3 formats:

I've found that it's best to pick each format based on three criteria:

Paperback/Hardcover Books (Physical)

eBook

Note: It's important to address why I don't like to read technical books as eBooks:

code samples and diagrams are often crafted with the physical copy of a book in mind, not eBooks.

If you've ever read a technical book on an eBook, you've likely found that diagrams don't scale properly (often even bleeding off the page or being so incredibly small you need a reading loop to make sense of it) and that code samples don't fit on the page properly or worse extend off the page and can't be read.

Audio Books

Almost exclusively fiction. The only time I generally listen to audio books is when I'm doing something else that requires attention but isn't deep work. For example:

I can listen to a fiction and pay attention while also "fully" tending to the other task I'm doing without feeling the need to concentrate or worse, hearing something I want to highlight or write down because it resonated with me.

I hope that this approach has at the very least given you a sense of how to pick formats of books yourself and at best given you a framework to figure your out your own approach. Happy reading!

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