fantastic thoughts to increase reading books....

ps, totally excited about the list of books, try reading "The Shaping of The Modern World", its not relevant to social media, its just an awesome book about Genghis Khan.

Hey, I appreciate this new attempt you are making at creating the breakdown of the blog-sphere. On a slightly different note thought, I am very interested in the Social Media developments as of late.Location based apps are the next step and not that Facebook did not go in the right direction with Places, but every social network needs to step it up a bit and make location relevant in real time. It is more than knowing what places are nearby, its also about knowing what types of services are available for use right then and there. It's about putting people directly in contact with the event/place/product they seek when they seek it. Please let me know if there are any developments happening in this field right now, what can we expect in 2011 from location based applications.

Last year I read only 18 books, but in 2011 I hope to get even to 25. Reading is a relaxing activity to help you develop your personality

Put Leslie Gelb's Power Rules on your list for this year. Starred Review. Gelb, Pulitzer Prize winning columnist for the New York Times, sets out guidelines for stewarding American power through the 21st century in this thoughtful, comprehensive and engaging examination. Drawing on Machiavelli's The Prince, the author addresses current leaders and their real-world choices, aiming his critiques at the soft and hard powerites, America's premature gravediggers, the world-is-flat globalization crowd, and the usually triumphant schemers who make up the typical U.S. foreign policy roundtable. Gelb writes that America remains the world's most powerful single nation, but this does not mean that the U.S. has absolute or even dominant global hegemony. Along with other major nations, it must accept the principle of mutual indispensability, and work toward global objectives with the full cooperation of Russia, China and other emerging powers. Gelb's bulleted rules and clear advice to President Obama distill his moderate strategic thinking on the future of America: a poised, posed, and credible sword, wrapped in diplomacy and economic power. It is a vision of a pragmatic but responsible global U.S. presence that eschews partisan politics and should find favor in the coming political clime. (Apr.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Review Les Gelb, one of America's most distinguished practitioner-observers of foreign policy, brilliantly explains how a series of administrations weakened our nation's security, and shows how we can reverse this trend. . . . Power Rules is an indispensable book for the new era. --Richard Holbrooke

I like the 20-pages per day approach! I read at least one book each week (all non-fiction), sometimes more. To keep the momentum going I use a combination of audio books in the car and at the gym, and my Kindle, which has become a constant companion. Reading gets easier once it becomes part of the routine (like brushing your teeth). If I go a few days without learning something new, I start to get a little restless! I'm also an entrepreneur, author, speaker and mom so if I can read a book each week, anyone can!

As of your blog post and Julien Smith's too I decided to make this as my new challenge for 2011 - http://florinabaciu.posterous.com/how-i-will-read-26-books-a-year. Thank you for the inspiration, David! Florina

Count me in as well!

Here are the list of books for 2011 (January and Feb) Books are slow in Malaysia lol..It should be in the list. I roughly start with few of them) -The new rules of marketing & PR -Real time marketing & PR -Big book of social media -Content Rules

This is one of the best blog post I read the entire day. I gave myself so much excuses of not having the time to do much thing. Instead by just reading 20 pages a day I could read two books a month. No more excuses!!!!

I do think there should be nothing structured in reading a book, unless its for a professional examination or to further one's career prospects. Other than that reading should only be to improve one's mind and should be a leisure activity. That one must read, of course, is a sine qua non. He who thinks he is always right, with apologies to Mencius, not only does not think, but does not read either!

Thank you for this idea! I love reading but have never set such a concrete reading goal like this. Will give it a try. Good luck to you for 2011!

We have read many of the same books Dave - next time you are in Calif LMK and we should chat over coffee to discuss a few.

Last year going into 2010, I decided to do 1 resolution for each month. One month I decided to finally look into volunteering in my beloved town (I did and became actively involved in the GED tutoring program), another month I decided to get a handle on my finances (this, I am sorry to say, will be repeated in 2011) and commit to reading 1 chapter per day of something. I tend to read 1 business book and 1 leisure book at the same time quite regularly. I have been able to commit to this reading schedule and if life interrupts and I miss a day, then I read 2 chapters the next day.

All right I'm going to try too! I see a few on your list I still need to read. If you need some fiction recommendations I would suggest the Girl who had the Dragon Tattoo (but it is considerably longer than 280 pages...)

Here are some great books that I've read: 1) Writing with Style by John R. Trimble 2) Groundswell 3) Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell 4) Why We Buy by Paco Underhill. I'm also coming up with a list of 12 books to read in 2011. That seems like a more realistic goal to me, but 24 sounds a little more interesting after reading this post. I'll be posting my list sometime next week.

I'd love to hear how the book works out - please stop back here and let me know if you like it!

From Eternity To Here by Sean Carroll

This is easy. I'll do it. Bring it on.

I remember reading Julien's post last year, Dave, and was similarly inspired. However, unlike you, I didn't follow through. I aim to correct that this year. In fact, I already have four books on the wait list (a few of which I got as Xmas gifts). Thanks for sharing your list of books read in 2010--see a few in there I might add to my 2011 list.

Okay Mr. Fleet...I'm in! See you at the end of 2011! ;)