Starting a Reading Journal

[seleneheart]

In 2024, I decided to start reading published books again, instead of long-form fanfic downloaded from AO3, because I needed more of a challenging read than fanfic provides. To stay motivated for 2025, I'm participating in a Book Bingo challenge. All of the above led me to decide that I want to start a journal dedicated to my reading.

And I don't want anything digital, otherwise, my Goodreads list would be adequate.

I've looked at some that people have posted here, and trying to figure out what I want to do. I think I want a bigger size that my A5 bullet journal, and I think I want to do less hand-drawn art that what I put in my bujo. Maybe more scrapbook-y and less time-consuming. I definitely want to do something like print out the book covers on sticker paper.

What type of information do you include? How do you sequence the books? Do you have a daily reading log or something similar?


Mods: could we get a style: reading journal tag?

Comments

[ioplokon]

I use one my dad got me as a gift because, hey - free journal, but I tho it's too small for your needs.

I track: title, author(s), publisher, publication year, date started/finished, subject, and then my general thoughts + a star rating.

One thing I have found frustrating about dedicated reading journals that have set questions/rubrics is that they don't tend to handle a diverse selection of genres (especially if you read both fiction & nonfiction). So may want to take that into account when you are deciding what to record.

Ultimately, I guess, think about what the purpose of the journal is. For me, there are 2. I want to keep track of what I read & have some quick notes to refer to later if I do a fuller review, and I want to use it to find more books I might like (especially branching out to smaller presses, which is why I track publisher). Your needs might be different (tracking frequency of reading, maybe?) & so the journal should be, too.

[seleneheart]

I want to have a place to write down my thoughts about the book, as well as quotes. I also want to track the things you suggest. I hadn't thought about tracking publisher, but that's a good idea for smaller presses. I hadn't thought about genre either. Thanks!

[white_aster]

To try out the size and format, you could sketch out and print some formats on 8.5x11 paper and use them in a three-ring binder or discbound format for a bit. Bonus is you could print out the line spacing or dotgrid that you like to write on, and use whatever grade/color of paper you want. It would let you see how much/how little you want to write cheaply. I'm sure you've already googled around (and maybe check out Etsy, too?), maybe mock up some formats that look promising in Gdocs or word or something and try them out?

The main consideration seems to be: what do you want to capture, and how much do you like to write about each book? Some folks seem to "journal" with just a brief review and extensive details about book, pages, publisher, etc., and some folks just want to lay down a title/author/rating and write a few pages of Opinions. Do you want to force yourself to do one page per book, or do you want to have formatting that allows you to write for several pages if you want? How much space do you want to leave for your scrapbooky elements vs. writing? If you think those elements will vary from book to book, then maybe it's better to just have blank pages that you can format however you want, which means any book of the right size will work.

For sequencing, for a paper book, I can't see anything but chronological-as-you-read working, unless you want to have sections broken down by genre or something? I don't know, formats like that always seem to beg to leave blank pages. i tend to prefer formats that just let me write from beginning to end without having to guess how many pages to leave for any particular thing. But then, I tend to also only write about a book when I'm done reading it. If you want to write about things in more journal format (by date), then you could do more of a diary by date format and I don't know...have a full review on the date you finish it? I'd also be tempted to have an index at the front listing books and page numbers, and maybe just a list of titles at the end as a how-many-books-I-read tracker.

As for topics/writing prompts on the pages, do you like those or do you find them too restrictive? One way to judge is to look at any reviews you've written on Goodreads or such. See what you tend to like to talk about. For me, if I was going to do a dedicated book reading journal, I'd just do author, title, my final rating, and then maybe sections for what I liked and didn't like. In fact, I might have an index page of "topics to talk about" to refer to, and just refer to it while I wrote as much as I wanted about the book, then moved on to the next book I finished. That's all I'd really need, and it would work regardless of genre or fiction/nonfiction. But then, I don't like a lot of structure when I journal.

[seleneheart]

I need to put an entry for a book as soon as I start, or I'll never remember when I'm for brick space books (actual books?). For digital stuff, my Kindle has all of that, so I can go back and figure it out.

Making an index for all the books is a great idea, I'm going to incorporate that.

I don't really want prompts, other what Book Bingo is providing which are very broad. I want enough space to write whatever my thoughts are on the book. Maybe one sentence or several paragraphs. I want a list of data points (I guess) for the book, and then whatever occurs to me. Maybe one book inspires more artwork or another inspires more words.

[white_aster]

Gotcha. For that level of flexibility, a binder or discbound system is really ideal - whenever you start a book, you can fill out your "start page" format (giving details on it), and then just keep filling pages with discussion of that book as you'd like, adding them in after that start page until you're done. (This is assuming that you want to have all your discussion of one book together.) This would allow you to write about the books at different times, but order them manually so they're all together.

[phantomtomato]

My system is very unstructured (and I don’t keep these entries in a separate journal, either; they go right in my main one). What I like to do is to write a new entry when I finish a book, which I use as a space to draft the post I will eventually put up on Dreamwidth. I put down the author and title, but nothing else. Sometimes I will write a short entry partway through a book, especially if I want to keep notes about something that I’m afraid I’ll forget by the end, but for most books it is only that one entry at the conclusion.

The important part for me is the practice of taking space to digest my thoughts/feelings on paper. I don’t use prompts. The balance is usually in favor of one or two main themes, or a character/relationship arc, in the book, with enough plot summary in the first or second paragraph to put it all in context. I often end up writing about this book in comparison with other things in the genre or era that I’ve read. I like to think about how my reading fills out what I know, my expectations for tropes, archetypes, plots, etc. I also tend to comment on what worked well for me, and what did not. My goal is to be analytical in my book journaling, but with a focus on the personal (my reactions, my experiences).

Good luck with your new journal! It’s been really fulfilling for me to make a practice of reading professionally published fiction (in addition to fanfic), and I hope that your 2025 bingo goes well. :)

[seleneheart]

Previously, the most I was doing for the books I read was to have one spread at the beginning of my bujo where I just noted the titles. Now, I want to expand on that.

I don't want to use prompts either, but you've given me so good ideas about the things I might want to discuss in my journal. Like you, focusing on my reactions and experiences with the book.

[olivermoss]

I love mine which is an A5, but if I was starting again I'd go larger, ideally an 8x8 square layout.

I do titles, authors and a short write up meant for me. It's different from a review I'd post elsewhere, it's only meant to be read by me. I don't do any stats or star ratings. I just post books in order. I pencil them in as I finish them, and then do the layouts and writing in bursts. I also have a book bingo page and a 'books read in 2025' layout. Starting from the back I am doing more things like an Agatha Christie tracker, because I want to get through all her books, and some other series-specific pages.

[seleneheart]

It's different from a review I'd post elsewhere, it's only meant to be read by me.

Yes, that's exactly what I want - maybe incoherent rambling that would never make it into a post, but means something only to me. I don't really have any space to do that right now.

I'm seriously considering an 8x8.

[lunabee34]

I have seen some interesting kinds of reading journals; I don't know if any of them would work for you or contains elements you could use, but I'll link them.

Clever Fox Reading Journal

https://www.jetpens.com/Mark-s-EDiT-Reading-Notebook-Brown/pd/33483

https://www.jetpens.com/Paperian-Book-Tracker-Cards-White-Pack-of-12/pd/46180

(Tag added!)

[seleneheart]

Oooh, thanks for the links!!

And the tag. ^_^

[lunabee34]

You're welcome!

[halfcactus]

Typically just the title/author, a star rating, maybe a thumbnail of the cover, and my thoughts. My regular planner is pretty much my reading log though it's skewed more to comics/webtoons--I read so much they've become a blur so I need to actually write about them so I can remember which is which.

Everyday Explorers has clear stamps for book journaling, maybe you can get ideas from that!

[seleneheart]

Those are some great stamps - thanks for the link!

[a_natural_beauty]

I wish you the best of luck with your reading!

[seleneheart]

Thanks!

[a_natural_beauty]

You're welcome!