The Benefits of Tracking What I Read, Part 1

Do you keep track of what you read? If so, how? A spreadsheet? A plain old Word or Google doc?

And if you do track what you read, why? Do you have a larger purpose than a mere record?

For me, keeping track of what I read was a bit of an afterthought. I originally started keeping track of the books I WANT to read.

Book recommendations come from all sorts of places:

• mentions on social media

• a review in The Horn Book Magazine

• an email from a friend who describes what she’s reading

• a text from my sister

So I started putting them all in one place with the author’s name, the book’s title, year published, what it’s about or why I might be interested, and who recommended it.

For example: Sepetys, Ruta. I Must Betray You. 2022. Set in Romania in 1989, YA spy novel. Rec by Annemarie O’Brien.

The Romania setting is important because it was home to one of the most brutal dictators behind the Iron Curtain, and 1989 is when he was overthrown. Also, several years ago when I was editor of The Grinnell Magazine, I visited Romania to interview a Grinnell College alum, Florin Cîţu. (At the time, he’d recently been elected to the Romanian Senate. As of this writing, he’s the prime minister.)

Because I adored Code Name Verity, a YA, WWII-era spy novel by Elizabeth Wein, the words “YA spy novel” are enough to remind me why I wanted to read Sepetys’s new novel. Plus, ever since I was a kid, I’ve been fascinated with spying.

Annemarie O’Brien, a fellow Vermont College of Fine Arts alum, recommended I Must Betray You on Facebook. (I noted it because Annemarie published a beautiful historical MG novel set in Russia called Lara’s Gift.)

Whenever I hear of a book that sounds interesting, I add it to my list. The list has anywhere from 10 to 20 books on it at a time.

After I read a book from the “To Read” list, I move it to the “Books I’ve read” list. Then I add some brief thoughts about the characters, the plot, or whatever grabbed my attention as a writer.

More on the usefulness of the “Books I’ve read” list next time.