[jbcohen]

The quickest that I have ever read a 300 page novel is in four days. What's your record?

[Lani]

My record is reading a 700 pages novel in one day...

[Mithfânion]

Spped reading is of zero relevance to me. I've never tried to read fast. I don't read every day either. I guess it would take me on average two weeks to finish a 300 page novel.

[Bond]

When I read Jordan's WoT for the first time I read from The Eye of the World to A Crown of Swords in 7 days. Now let's see, 800 pages or so per day so that would be around 400 pages in 12 hours or about 300 pages in nine hours. A rough reading speed estimate of 33 pages per hour though I'm probably a little quicker than that because I did catch some sleep--but not much. http://www.sffworld.com/ubb/wink.gif

Now you guys know why in part I have such a high opinion of Jordan, I couldn't put the dang thing down! Hmm... I wonder if Moghedien was in the room and placing me under the compulsion?

[This message has been edited by Bond (edited February 09, 2002).]

[Limor]

It really does depend on how much free time I have. During my unemployed "era" I could go through a 300 page book in about 3-4 days, now I only get about one or two hours of reading a day and not every day so it takes longer.

Also I found that the level of interest i have in the book will effect my reading speed, currently I'm trying to finish the last book of the ELENIUM in order to move on to the WoT, however since I'm not finding it too interesting (which is very surprising after reading the Belgariad and Molloreon and enjoyed them both VERY VERY much) it's actually going very slow.

[Alucard]

Depends. I read fiction a lot faster than fantasy. In fiction, a lot more is a given. We all know what an atm machine is, we all know what a drive through is, the stories are filled with familiars that don't need expanations. So you usually just get a lot more plot and character development. I tear through these. 300 pages is done in a sitting or two. (Though, I read a great deal of mysteries, which, if good, are really hard to put down).

But with fantasy, a lot of time is spent explaining the odditites of the world or society we're reading about. There is a lot of space dedicated to explaining a world's economic system, cultures, agriculture, political structures, etc. Because of this, fantasy novels feel a bit more exhuasting to me, so I usually don't read them nearly as fast. On average, a fantasy novel takes me twice as long as a fiction one does. Not that this is a bad thing, sometimes I like staying with a book longer. I usually get to know the characters a bit better.

On a side note, I really like switching off between the two. I'll usually read fantasy novel, then plow through some fiction, then sit back down with a fantasy novel; rinse and repeat. By switching off, both genres feel a bit fresher.

[DarthV]

I guess it depends on the book. TSR/WOTC novels are pretty quick reads...I figure I go through about 70-90 pages/hour with those. But for most books, it's 40-60 pages/hour. It just depends on the content and how easy it is to absorb the material.

[Sar]

I can get through 300pages in about 2 hours depending on the author. On average I read between 150-200 pages an hour.

[Corwwyn]

As mentioned above it depends a lot on content and writing style.

I tend to cruise an average of around 50-60 pages an hour.

Books like Alan Dean Foster's SpellSinger series I roar through at around 100 pages an hour, whereas Harry Harrison's West of Eden or C J Cherryh's Hunter of Worlds slowed me down to around 20 pages per hour.

West of Eden and Hunter of Worlds both had names and terms in difficult to remember "languages" being either long, similar, and or with non-standard character sets.

This made it hard to work out and remember who was who, and who was being referred to later on, etc.

There are other things that can slow my reading down:

Overly large or small, or fuzzy/faded print;

an overdose of prevaricative narrative;

the amount of explanation required to visualize the settings and events;

how differently the author writes compared to how my own way of thinking (eg. the effect Shakespeare can have on many first time readers).


[Edited to remove [LI] tags which don't seem to work on this board. -Cor]

[This message has been edited by Corwwyn (edited February 09, 2002).]

[The Iron Orchid]

Why, is this a new Olympic event?