Expanding my Reading Horizons with BAND

October26

In July, a small group of book bloggers came together to form the Bloggers’ Alliance of Non-Fiction Devotees (BAND). I’m not sure how I missed the launch, but when Amy of Amy Reads drew my attention to the group in a recent post, I was intrigued.

stranger than fiction cartoon I first became interested in non-fiction (outside of post-secondary education) in my mid-twenties when, quite unusually for my age, I became interested in tracing my family history. I devoured genealogical research and social history books, and those, along with biographies & memoirs are my preferred NF read to this day.

But it seems to me that I don’t read many non-fiction titles any more. It’s not that I don’t like them; it’s just that there seem to be so many fiction books I want to read that I don’t get around to the NF. So I counted up my reads over the last couple of years and I was little surprised at how “well” I’ve done. In 2010, I read 31 non-fiction titles out of a total of 123 books. That’s a respectable 25%! So far this year, I managed only 12 (out of 110), or about 10%.

Amy’s inaugural post reminds me that I do “love the random topics and collections of facts that come from (…) non-narrative nonfiction.” So I’m going to try to consciously incorporate more such titles into my TBR short list. If you’d like to do the same, don’t miss BAND’s tmblr page!

posted under What Are You Reading?

8 Comments to

“Expanding my Reading Horizons with BAND”

On October 26th, 2011 at 7:52 pm Elizabeth Says:
I missed you – I have come to depend on hearing about your reads [a vicarious pleasure] glad you have returned! -E.
On October 27th, 2011 at 12:15 am Debbie Says:
Ah, thank you Elizabeth. It’s good to be missed. Rest assured, I have still been reading–perhaps even more voraciously–just not blogging about it. I hope to get make up for some lost time, very soon.
On October 26th, 2011 at 8:01 pm Nan Says:
Good for you! I do love nonfiction. I like learning about historical people and situations.
On October 27th, 2011 at 12:14 am Debbie Says:
It was the learning about the history surrounding my ancestors’ lives that really kick-started my love for non-fiction. Nan. Funny – I hated history in school, but would give a mint to go back & take it again LOL
On October 27th, 2011 at 1:18 pm Amy Says:
It’s interesting sometimes to go back and count and realize how much you’ve really read of a certain type of book isn’t it? I’m always surprised anyway if I’m not consciously paying attention. Glad to hear you like nonfiction and have been reading more than you thought. I hope you find some new great stuff 🙂
On October 27th, 2011 at 8:03 pm Debbie Says:
Thank you, Amy – I’m sure I will!
On October 28th, 2011 at 10:36 am Barbara Says:
I’ve always loved history and biography, the latter because I’m just plain nosy about other people’s lives. This despite my high school history teachers. I blame them for turning kids off of history by concentrating on dates, wars, heads of state, etc., and leaving the lives of ordinary people completely out. The thing that got my husband interested was going to historic sites with me and learning how people lived – how they cooked, where their food came from, how they made things, how they kept warm (or didn’t) and all those ordinary day-to-day things. Now he loves history.
On October 29th, 2011 at 3:21 pm Leslie Says:
I thought I read a fair amount of non-fiction but when I look back at what I’ve read this year it’s more narrative non-fiction. Which I guess is better than not reading any non-fiction at all. I’ll have to check out the BAND page.