The Book Nerd’s Guide to Prioritizing Your To-Read List

Welcome to the Book Nerd’s Guide to Life! Every other week, we convene in this safe place to discuss the unique challenges of life for people whose noses are always wedged in books. For past guides, click here.
Far be it from me to speak for you, dear reader, but personally, I ingest new reads like a sponge absorbs water. My proverbial pores are clogged with paperbacks and hardbacks and specialty rereleases and a few ebooks because I was too impatient to wait for a package from the book fairy (FedEx) to arrive.
Unlike a sponge, which recognizes its natural limits, my capacity to take in new books never diminishes, until I am forced by the rules of object permanence to move to a bigger apartment. And by “object permanence,” I, of course, am referring to “an intervention on an episode of Hoarders.”
It’s a vicious cycle, of continuously taking in books and reading books and never once catching up. Meanwhile, the imposing backlog of novels, memoirs, and comics that has subsumed my living room, dining room, two nightstands, and quite possibly the dog only grows.
But what is there to do, in this purely hypothetical situation that in no way reflects my (or your) cluttered reality? Clearly, the flow of books isn’t going to stop anytime soon. So let’s set reasonable plans of action. By that, I mean let’s prioritize.
What do you read first when you have everything to read? It’s a multilayered question with an equally complex answer.
Much like the four opened bags of tortilla chips in the pantry (once again, entirely hypothetical), it’s important to consider consuming the oldest books in the pile first. Sure, they’re not going to go stale, but they could so easily be buried under the heaps of newcomers that follow.
But sell-by date can’t solely determine reading order, otherwise you’d never reach the current year in publishing dates. There are myriad other considerations when choosing what to pick up next.
Your Current Mood
Do you need a good cry? Do you need a good laugh? Do you need a good sense of existential dread?
Your Outside Reading Commitments
Are you in a book club? Are you in 10 book clubs? Did a coworker put you on the hook for reading something with her, thus instituting an 11th book club?
Your Reading Goals
It’s nearing the end of the year, and it’s entirely possible you’re falling behind your ambitious book goal. If you’ve plowed through a couple doorstopper novels, maybe you don’t want to pick up a commitment like that new epic fantasy. Maybe now’s the time for a graphic novel.
Your Pop Culture Commitments
The second or third season of that TV show you love is coming back soon, and you promised yourself you’d read up to the equivalent point in the book series. What can you do but escalate the priority?
Your Tidiness
Sometimes you just read whatever book your eye falls on first. Many classic reads have gained popularity simply by having the good fortune of being stacked someplace obvious. (I think this is true.)
For me, balancing these considerations requires great feats of mental calculation (i.e., generally I’m reading whatever’s in closest proximity to me). I don’t think this is a flawed approach, whatever it takes for books to get read.
On that note, I can’t believe you’re still here reading this instead of the entirely hypothetical towers of books in your guest bedroom.