It’s November, which means finals are just around the corner. But that book for your English class is still sitting untouched in your backpack.
As a former English major who had to read a ton of novels, I quickly learned the best ways to finish a boring book quickly.
Is it better to have finished the book on time and taken your time with every page? Yes. But let’s be honest, whether you are an English major with three other novels to read or a high school student slogging through Lord of the Flies, it is better to read a book as quickly as possible than not finish it at all. Because the professor can always tell who actually read the book and who just read the Wikipedia summary.
Here are my tried tips for finishing that dreaded book quickly and efficiently.
Watch a video summary beforehand
I did this for every single novel I had to read for class and it was a lifesaver, especially for my Shakespeare and Chaucer classes. Go on Wikipedia or search YouTube for a summary of your book before you start reading. That way, you can focus less on following the storyline and more on the themes, character development, and details that you will need to write a great paper.
It’s a numbers game, so divide the pages up
It’s all about the pages! Divide up how many days you have left to read against how many pages are left in the book. Reading a little every day will help way more than trying to cram it into one night.
Listen as you read
With novels written before the 1900s, it is easy to get lost and confused in the diction. This is why I recommend listening to an audiobook of the book as you read along. I always increase the speed to at least 1.25 or 1.5 speed to match my natural reading pace. This allowed me to pick up on nuances of tone that I would have missed if I just read it. With an audiobook, I could listen to the book as I walked to class or did my laundry to save even more precious time.
If the book or work is very old or in the public domain, chances are you will be able to find a free audiobook of it on YouTube. If you can’t find one, try using your local library’s digital catalog.
Don’t read EVERYTHING
This may sound counterintuitive, but reading every single word can slow you down. This tip takes practice, but after years of English classes, I quickly learned that some passages needed extra attention, while some could just be skimmed. After you know the major plot points and the themes to look out for, it becomes easier to skim (not skip) paragraphs. Especially if you are on a time crunch, try engaging in the English major’s art of skimming.
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