A Favorite Place to Read

By Terry Whalin @terrywhalin

Consistent reading is one of the important skills for every writer to maintain and develop. To write for a particular mnagazine, you want to read this publication either in print or online to know what they are publishing. Publications have guidelines and you want to read those guidelines and follow them before sending in your query or article. This information is critical to give your submission the best chance of getting published. Also in the book area, you want to be reading books like you want to write. If you want to write children's books, you need to be aware of what is getting published and if you are writing fiction, you need to be reading what others are doing in your area. While reading is an important skill, do you have a favorite place to read?

 

Many years ago when I worked at Christianity.com and lived in northern California, my wife surprised me with a brown leather chair for my office. We've moved a number of times but this chair has been a consistent part of my office and it's where I've been reading for years. In my current office, the movers struggled to get this chair into the room. They had to manuever a narrow hallway and turn it to get it into this room—not an easy process but they got it done.

 

My leather chair is an important part of my office equipment. I read some things on my computer screen but for concentated reading or reading for pleasure, I physically move from my desk to my leather reading chair. For me, the physical movement from my desk to my reading chair is also a mental mind shift from writing to reading or consuming information.

 

There are several things which are important about in my writing life about this physical shift:

1. It is a consistent habit

2. when I get books to read and possibly review, I know how to handle it

3. when I read magazines I know where I will read them and put them beside my reading chair. I have a plan and don't clutter my desk or mix it into other paperwork.

4. It helps me keep organized and orderly in my office. In general an organized writer is a productive writer.

 

A reading chair is a consistent part of my writing life. Do you have a favorite place to read? Let me know in the comments below.

 

 Tweetable:

Reading is an important skill for every writer. This prolific editor and author tells about his favorite place to read and asks if you have such a place. Get the details here. (ClickToTweet)

Does your fiction or nonfiction book have a business plan? Every type of book needs a proposal—even if you self-publish. Get this resource.

Other recent articles I've written:

Five Reasons to Review Books In a related topic to this one about my reading chair, I encourage every writer to review books with five different reasons for such action.

Every Writer Must Build An Audience In this article, I give details about the mysterious word “platform” and why every writer needs to find their audience and what it takes to build one.