Over the past few years, the number of books I’ve read has slowly but surely increased with each new year.

For a while, the totals hovered around the 70s, but in 2022, for the first time ever, I read over 90 books.

Though I didn’t go into 2023 with the goal of reading 100 books for the first time, I was able to do so and ended up reading 110 books total for the year.

How was I able to read 100+ books in a year for the first time, as a married adult with a full-time job and a side career as an indie author? Honestly, it wasn’t as hard as I imagined it would be.

Utilizing Pockets of Time

A factor that allowed me to get in at least 40 minutes of reading each weekday was utilizing my two, twenty minute breaks at work per day. Though I don’t always read during my breaks, I try to most days. Reading at a speed of about one page per minute, I’m able to read around 40 pages a day on my breaks.

I also try to read for at least twenty minutes, often more, when I’m home, while my husband and his team are practicing before their bowling league, and in other spare pockets of time. This extra reading, paired with the 40 minutes I read on my work breaks, often adds up to an hour or more of reading per day, which allows me to finish most books within 3 to 5 days. Especially because…

Kindle’s Text-To-Speech Feature

I’m also not physically reading all these books! Since I’m a Kindle girlie and read mostly eBooks, I often listen to eBooks using the built-in text-to-speech feature on my Kindle Fire while I’m driving home from work or doing housework.

In 2023, after my husband gave me some Bluetooth earphones for Christmas in 2022, I began to utilize the text-to-speech feature more than ever. I’m wholeheartedly convinced this is the main reason why the amount of books I read increased last year!

A Couple Notes: 1) Unfortunately, the text-to-speech feature is not available on the Kindle phone app. As far as I know, it’s just on the Kindles and Fire tablets. 2) In case you were worried about my safety, I don’t wear the earphones while I’m driving. Instead, I connect my Kindle to my car’s Bluetooth and listen to it over the car speakers that way. 🙂

Reading Shorter Books

Most of the books I read are between 200-400 pages, so it’s not like I’m flying through dozens of epic fantasy novels or thick classics. The longest book I read in 2023 was Little Women, and my hardcover copy was 528 pages… which took me literally all year to read because I didn’t have the option of listening to it. The majority of the books I read are either contemporary YA, romcoms, mystery/thrillers, etc. which tend to have shorter page counts.

Talk to Me, Arrowheads!

How do you squeeze more reading time in? Share your methods in the comments!

Aim high, stay strong, and always hit your mark.

-Allyson 😀