reading habits survey

I found this set of questions at Pretty Deadly Reviews and thought it might be interesting to do.

Do you snack while you read? If so, favourite reading snack?
Sometimes. I don't make a habit of it, but I will continue to read while I'm eating a snack. There's no particular food that I tend to eat while reading.

Do you tend to mark your books as you read, or does the idea of writing in books horrify you?
If you consider the fact that I'm a librarian, you'd think I'd be horrified by the idea of writing in books. But, it really doesn't bother me much, in fact the majority of the books I read in college and graduate school are full of underling and marginalia. I've also been known to dog-ear (horror of horrors!) when I don't have a bookmark on hand. Now, I would do such things to a library book or a book that was loaned to me. Such treatment is reserved for my own books.

How do you keep your place while reading a book? Bookmark? Dog-ears? Laying the book flat open?
Well, I already confessed to dog-earring above. I prefer to use a bookmark (or the flap of the dustjacket), but I do dog-ear and I do lay books face-down if they can handle it (ie. I don't break spines just so I can save my place). Russell find the face-down book-leaving particularly vexing and is liable to try to make me feel guilty about it, but I caught him doing it this weekend.

Fiction, Non-fiction, or both?
Both, but primarily fiction.

Hard copy or audiobooks?
Any and all. I like audiobooks for knitting and long car trips. I have a Nook and am now fine with reading e-books (something to which I really wasn't sure that I'd be open). I prefer to have hard copies of my favorite books (hardcover when possible as they hold up better than perfect-bound paperbacks) so I can easily reread them.

Are you a person who tends to read to the end of chapters, or are you able to put a book down at any point?
I prefer to leave off at the end of a chapter. I've been like that since I was a child ("just one more chapter, Mom, then I'll go to sleep"). But, I will leave off mid-chapter if necessary.

If you come across an unfamiliar word, do you stop to look it up right away?
Not usually. In most cases you can get a general idea of a word's meaning when seeing it in context. Sometimes I will mark the page with an unfamiliar (or one you don't often see or one that is particularly interesting) so I can look it up later and possibly feature it on this blog. (see featured-word posts)

What are you currently reading?

1. Mercy by Rebecca Lim (forthcoming)
2. Museum Archives: An Introduction edited by Deborah Wythe
3. Original Knickerbocker: The Life of Washington Irving by Andrew Burstein
4. Possessions: The History and Uses of Haunting in the Hudson Valley by Judith Robinson
5. Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories edited by Kelly Link and Gavin Grant (forthcoming)
6. Tiny Sunbirds, Far Away by Christie Watson

What is the last book you bought?
Well I'm not supposed to be buying new books.
Before I moved I received a couple of Amazon gift cards, which I used to get a Mortal Instruments box set containing City of Bones, City of Ashes, and City of Glass all by Cassandra Clare.
I still have $90-something left, but I'm not sure what I'll spend it on.

Are you the type of person that only reads one book at a time or can you read more than one at a time?
As should be obvious from one of my answers above, I like variety so I'm often reading more than one book at a time. I don't usually have quite so many books going at one, but three or four is pretty standard. I've been trying to keep that sidebar section up to date so you can always check there to see what I'm working my way through.

Do you have a favorite time of day and/or place to read?
A favorite time of day to read I don't have. I read all the time, though mostly in the evenings as that's when I tend to have the time.
I usually have a book on hand (I keep one in my purse just in case), but I prefer -- at least at this point in my life -- to read at home. Since we're still unpacking and there are boxes everywhere I haven't yet decided on my favorite spots.

Do you prefer series books or stand alone books?
I read both. I probably read more stand-alone books because there are more of them out there, but some of my favorite books are installments in a series.

Is there a specific book or author that you find yourself recommending over and over?
Since I've read Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games trilogy (Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Mockingjay), I've recommended it quite a bit.

Others frequent recommendees (yes, I know that isn't a word) include The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood, anything by Jasper Fforde, and Zahrah and the Windseeker by Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu.

All We Know of Love by Katie Schneider is one of my favorites, but I don't often give it as a recommendation (see this post for why).

How do you organize your books? (By genre, title, author’s last name, etc.?)
That is something that we need to work on in our new space and I will post when I figure it out. At our old place my books were pretty organized categorically: bookcrossing books, knitting books, all others.